Development and management of engineering college libraries in Kerala

Abstract

Engineering practice and its related technologies have become global in scope and scale. To be effective, today’s engineering graduates must not only be grounded in scientific and mathematical fundamentals, engineering principles, and design, but also have a global outlook and the broader skills to work in society in both their home country and internationally. Engineering education is thus challenged to prepare a technically competent graduate, as it has done traditionally, and to add several dimensions of broadening—all within a program of reasonable length. The NBA accreditation is playing an important role in improving the quality of programs provided in the engineering colleges (ECs). The overall objective of the study is to understand the development and management of engineering college libraries in Kerala. It is mainly aimed at analysing the resources and services, ICT infrastructure and facilities, collection development, and management of information resources in the engineering college libraries that have the accredited programs of the NBA, and also making a comparative study of these resources with the engineering colleges that do not have the accredited programs of the NBA.Out of 158 engineering colleges, the researcher selected 120 as a sample. Only 36 of the 120 engineering colleges have NBA-accredited programs. The research method used to carry out the study was the survey method. In order to accomplish the objectives of the study, four methods were used: document review, questionnaire surveys, interviews with librarians, and observational visits in the libraries. The researcher adopted the questionnaire as the main tool for data collection. The librarians of engineering colleges are the respondents to the study. For collecting data from the engineering college libraries, the researcher converted the questionnaire into an online form using JotForm. The data received from the respondents was evaluated and analysed for the study results. SPSS version 21 was used to do the required statistical analysis. The researcher used statistical techniques like the simple percentage method, arithmetic mean, standard deviation, chi square, and fisher’s exact test to draw the findings and conclusions.The study found that most of the Government, under Government departments and Self-financing ECs which have the accredited programs of NBA show similarities in their library resources, services, facilities and other aspects. But when comparing these aspects with the engineering colleges that do not have the accredited programs of NBA, it is found that NBA accredited ECs show higher availability of print resources, E-resources, staff, users and budget allocation. While considering the ICT infrastructure and facilities, libraries of engineering colleges which have the accredited programs of NBA also show differences in the availability of ICT tools, digital library, institutional repositories, digitization process and their membership in any consortia.The libraries of ECs which have the accredited programs of NBA shows an increase in the average annual growth of books, journals and bound volumes of journals with the ECs which do not have the accredited programs of NBA and they do not show much difference in the average annual growth of theses/dissertations/project reports, patents/standards and newspapers with the non- NBA accredited ECs’ libraries. As both NBA accredited and non-accredited ECs in Kerala show low level average annual growth in the number of users in their libraries, compared to the libraries of NBA accredited ECs, non-accredited one shows very low level of average annual growth in number of library users. Engineering college libraries in Kerala show low level average annual growth in the budget allocated to them and the libraries of NBA accredited engineering colleges show a very low level of average annual growth when compared to the engineering colleges which do not have the accreditation of NBA.A large majority of ECs which do not have the accredited programs of NBA are applied or in the process of applying for NBA accreditation for their engineering programs and the librarians of almost all of these libraries respond that the resources, services and facilities in their library are improved as an impact of NBA accreditation. A large majority of them also have the opinion that the NBA should emphasize some more criteria in its accreditation process. A large majority of librarians opine that the NBA should consider the feedback with regard to library collection and its usage andthe orientation and follow up programs which are conducted by the library for its faculty and students. More than 60 percent of EC librarians opine that the NBA should emphasize innovative measures in the library and the availability of services and products in the libraries.The engineering college librarians mainly report inadequate fund provision as their main problem for further improvement of their services. A good number of them respond to the problems like lack of a proper security system to prevent loss of the books and increased cost of hardware and software. More than one fourth of EC libraries report lack of knowledge to use E-resource among library users and inadequate space facilities. More than 20 percent of EC libraries respond to inadequate staff structure, inadequate furniture and equipment, difficulties for the subscription of foreign periodicals.Engineering benefits only when it is done for the right engineering college, which is highly reputed and imparts quality education. Technical Education can meet the escalating demands of a growing society and to meet its multiplying demands. With the conventional methods and stereo-typed general education, people acquire nothing to contribute to the progress and prosperity of human society. As the library plays a major role to satisfy the multidimensional information needs of the engineering professionals, a full fledged library is a necessity of any engineering college to attain its objectives well. In the study the engineering college libraries mainly raise the problem of inadequate fund provision. It is suggested that the authorities should give more importance in their budget allocation to their libraries and provide their support in other aspects also which will help the libraries to overcome their major problems and to improve their resources and services to make the engineering students education more qualitative and make them employable and more suitable for the job.