Teaching role of the Sri Lankan university librarians in the light of changing pedagogical paradigm brought about by the education policy reforms

Abstract

This paper briefly discusses the environmental threats to public universities with a special attention to Sri Lankan universities. Education policy reforms are used as a neutralising measure by the universities in counteracting these threats. As a result of the policy reforms pedagogical paradigm has changed, bringing the library to centre stage. Librarian’s role is subjected to evolution from library specific training to a more subject specific teaching role in providing life long learning skills to the students. However, the extent to which a librarian becomes a teacher depends on the nature of teaching offered by the library. If the library has no opportunity to offer more subject specific information literacy skills programmes, librarians are not in a position to fulfil their teaching role. Necessary conditions for librarians to function as fully fledged teachers and the problems encountered by the Sri Lankan university librarians are discussed. Finally some remedial measures, which will help overcoming these problems, are discussed. Throughout the paper the term “Librarian” will encompass Assistant librarians, Senior assistant Librarians, Deputy Librarians and Librarians