DIGITAL LITERACY CAMPAIGN BY THE INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY SECTION OF THE NIGERIAN LIBRARY ASSOCIATION

HIGHLIGHTS OF THE DIGITAL LITERACY TRAINING ORGANIZED BY THE NIGERIAN LIBRARY ASSOCIATION –INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY SECTION (NLA, I.T. SECTION) FROM 23^RD – 25^TH MAY, 2016 AT AHMADU BELLO UNIVERSITY LIBRARY, ZARIA, KADUNA STATE, NIGERIA. 

 

Day 1:  May 23, 2016- Opening ceremony

The opening ceremony was graced by, Prof. Zakari Mohammed- Dept. of Library and Information Science, A.B.U. Zaria, Dr. Abdullahi Ibrahim- Ag. University Librarian KIL, Dr. B. S. Adukwu- HOD Dept. of LIS, A.B.U. Zaria, Mr. Aliyu Abdulkadiri- Chairman NLA Kaduna State Chapter among others.

Welcome address

This was delivered by Dr. (Mrs.) Ngozi B. Ukachi, Chairperson, IT Section. Her presentation captured the following:

Ø One of the visions of the IT section is to train and equip Nigerian librarians to be digitally skilled and ready for effective global competition.

Ø Challenges associated with the acquisition of digital skills in Nigeria has left a lot of Library and information professionals (LIPs) to function more effectively in a traditional library setting.

Ø This Digital Literacy Campaign embarked upon by the current EXCO members of Information Technology Section of the Nigerian Library Association is aimed at eradicating digital illiteracy by provide training to the Librarians despite the numerous challenges in Nigeria.

Ø The training is from zone to zone within the country aiming at equipping Library and information professionals (LIPs) with 21^st century digital skills and knowledge for global competiveness with less financial and almost zero location constraints.

Ø This training differs from the Annual LITT workshops organized by the Section; it is more of a volunteer training service to libraries and librarians in Nigeria.

Dr. (Mrs) Ngozi B. Ukach, Chairperson, Information Technology Section of the Nigerian Library Association addressing colleagues during the Opening Ceremony

Keynote address

Presented by Professor Zakari Mohammed

Ø The 21^st century has strategically enthroned automation and manual approaches to doing things with the advances and application of ICTs in the methods and practices of information and knowledge management to cope with the changing needs, expectations and information seeking behavior of individual and organization in the digital age.

Ø Any discourse on acquisition of digital literacy skills and competencies by information services providers and managers, of which librarians are part of, need to be situated within the frame work and perspective of effective utilization of ICT potentials.

Ø  The advances in ICTs have led to the transformation of various administrative and service platforms into what is now known as e-library,  e-governance, e-business, e-banking, e-money, e-voting, e-conference, e-ticket, e-transaction, e-examination and interviews e- campaign, e-registration etc. the list is endless

Ø  From the foregoing, it could be concluded that ICTs will continuously impact much on information availability, access, retrieval, use, dissemination and storage in all sectors of the economy.

Ø  Libraries and information centres have to constantly strategies to be relevant and become indispensable in the schemes of the on-goings in the information society within the realm of information availability, access and utilization and services provision in the contemporary 21^st century.

Ø  The way forward:

o   The need for paradigm shift to world of post book dynasty

o   Pierce through books, printed information and document inclined contents

o   Get the best cheapest and easiest option to present and provide information to the customer

o   Library and information professionals (LIPs) must at this junction consider the acquisition of the best digital literacy skills and competencies.

 

Prof. Zakari Mohammed making presentation during the Opening Ceremony

Group photograph at the end of the Opening Ceremony

NLA, I.T. SECTION EXCO Members with Prof Zakari Mohammed

Afternoon

The practical sessions began immediately after the opening ceremony with a session on the topic: Amazing media for engaging communities for effective service delivery was anchored by Mr. David Oguche. The participants were guided through a practical session on how to develop and engage their library users’ online using blogs and Pinterest

Day 2: May 24th, 2016

Dr (Mrs.) Ngozi Ukachi, the Chairperson exposed participants to superlative online tools for collaboration and information sharing during the morning session. They were introduced to: Wikispaces, Google Drive, Dropbox, Tokini, Writr, Zoho writer, Producteev, etc, and finally guided to create Wikispaces.

Afternoon session was anchored by Mr. David Oguche. The topic was on “beating the internet gurus with extraordinary search skills”. The practical centers around using advanced search and understanding search engine mechanisms

Participants during one of the sessions

Day 3: 25th May, 2016

Dr (Mrs.) Ngozi Ukachi exposed participants to various channels for accessing free online trainings and webinars for skills development. Lots of practical took place and the participants were assisted to register for some free online trainings

The training was declared closed after a valedictory session.