Article from Chronicle

[Drew, Bill]

Thought every one would like to see this.  This is from the free version of
Academe this Week for those of you worried about copyright.
 
Bill Drew
 
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 The Chronicle of Higher Education
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Friday, December 17, 1999



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Few Colleges Provide Training for Designers of Libraries' Web Sites, Study
Finds

By  <mailto:vincent.kiernan at chronicle.com> VINCENT KIERNAN 


Large public colleges and universities are stingy with training for the
staff members who create their libraries' Web pages, a new study suggests. 


Most creators of the library sites learned the skills for Web-page design on
their own, not in formal classes, the study found. In general, colleges and
universities do not provide financial support for self-instruction or time
off to compensate for hours spent learning Web skills. 


The study, published this month in the journal Internet Research, is based
on a survey sent in January 1997 to the authors of library Web pages at 226
public colleges and universities with at least 7,500 full-time employees.
The author of the study is Beth Evans, an assistant professor in the library
at Brooklyn College of the City University of New York. 


Of the 124 institutions that responded to Ms. Evans' survey, 78 per cent
reported that their libraries' Web sites had been created by librarians,
while 20 percent reported that the work had been performed by a
non-librarian. 


All of the non-librarians and 94 per cent of the librarians who created Web
pages said that their Web skills were "largely self-taught," according to
the study. 


A key reason may be that few colleges and universities provided either time
or financial support for formal training: Only 37 per cent of the Web
authors said their institutions gave then time off for such classes, and
only 19 per cent received financial support. 


And only a handful of institutions assisted staff members who attempted to
teach themselves the necessary skills. Seven Web authors in the survey said
they got time off for self instruction, and three received financial
support, such as reimbursement for books. 


Ms. Evans warns that, over time, stinginess toward staff development may be
reflected in the quality of libraries' Web sites. "The less that an
institution invests in giving its Web authors skills to do their jobs, the
less likely they are too produce an exemplary product," she writes. 


David G. Schwartz, editor of Internet Research and a professor of
information systems at Bar-Ilan University, in Israel, said that the paper
should serve as a wake-up call to library administrators. "There are
fundamental changes that must take place in the training and
responsibilities of librarians in order to make the transition into the
Internet age," he said. "Libraries that choose to ignore it are risking
their traditional position as providers of information and doing so at their
own peril." 




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