Students' attitudes and perceptions on library user education programmes: A case study

Abstract

This study examined the effectiveness of various types of user education programmes offered by Library University of Moratuwa. Four user education programmes were considered in this study, 'Library Orientation and Tour', 'Information for Research', Research and Plagiarism' and 'How to do Referencing'. Attitudes and the perception of the students towards these user education programmes were discussed in this study. A user survey was adopted and the undergraduate students and post graduate students who have participated in library user education programmes during 2014-2015 was the target group. Results of the study discovered that 88% of the students have gained the knowledge on library resources and services through the library user education programmes. Most importantly, 91.3% of students have stated that they were equipped with good research skills by participating in these library user education programmes. Results of this study encourage the library to continue the user education programmes to keep building research skills of the students while making necessary adjustments to fulfill the needs of modern library users.