The role of academic librarians as information literacy instructors

Abstract

This long essay first describes the role of the academic library and academic librarian in the forefront of education and developing students into lifelong learners. It provides various definitions of information literacy according to different educational associations and library organizations. The second chapter introduces the aims and objectives of this study and a literature review focusing on the role of academic librarians as information literacy instructors. It also discusses the importance of collaboration between librarians and academics and the methods adopted by libraries to teach information literacy. Moreover, it presents a number of international studies performed within the information literacy context. Chapter three outlines the methodology adopted by the researcher to carry out this study, followed by detailed results and analysis of the pre-sessions and post-session questionnaires, the observations and interviews. Hence, Chapter four describes and discusses the results of the study. Finally, the last chapter summarizes the main findings of the results while offering recommendations for the continuous improvement of information literacy in Maltese academic libraries.