THE CHALLENGES OF ACQUISITION OF LIBRARY MATERIALS AND SERVICES TO THE USERS IN LAW LIBRARY IN EKITI STATE UNIVERSITY

Code No: 576212

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ABSTRACT

The objective of this study is to examine the challenges of acquisition of library materials and services to the users in law library in Ekiti State University. Survey research design was employed for the study and with aid of convenient sampling selected forty-one(41) participant who are Law library librarian, dean faculty of law, law lecturers and other library staff in Ekiti State University as the sample size for this study. The sources of data collection was both primary and secondary with the application of questionnaires as an instrument to gather the necessary data. Textbooks, journals, articles, law reports, newspapers publications, were collected as secondary data, and also limitations to the study were indicated. The questionnaires were administered to the 41 participant of which 35 responses were retrieved validated and this was a basis by which the primary data were collected. Data was analyzed using mean and standard deviation as presented in frequencies and tables. Findings of the study problems militating against effective selection and acquisition of legal materials of Ekiti University Faculty of Law library such as, lack of funds, absence/poor implementation of collection development policy, lack of capacity building for library staff, lack of technical capabilities in the areas of online databases and electronic resources, high cost of legal materials and lack of bibliographic control of published legal sources. The study therefore concludes that The law library should develop acquisitions policy, in other words collection development policy, to guide them in the selection and acquisition of legal materials. More, so, the government and parent institutions should provide enough funds to the law library to enable it carryout the acquisition process effectively.

CHAPTER 1

CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
Background of the study
Acquisition of information resources otherwise known as Collection Development is a core activity of libraries the world over. In the academic library, the acquisition section performs the variety of function and it is the chief link to the other section of the library. The acquisition section of the academic library is one of the vital sections which deal with the collection development in a significant away that controls all the activities of the library. It is referred to as the heart bite of every library be it E- Library or the traditional library. The notion that innovation in information technology (e-library) in information palace will affect traditional methods of acquisitions has not come to play. Libraries still acquire and maintain massive book collections while managing other information formats (Adesanya & Agyen, 2015).
Despite prophecies of vanishing print collections and the emergence of the digital format, printed resources (books, etc ) still have a central role in library acquisition ( Carr, 2011). The term acquisition is commonly used to denote several processes of acquisition that focus on the techniques of acquiring library materials. Acquisition of library materials operates within the constraints of certain conditions that vary from one place to other.
Prytherch (2011) says that the process of planning a stock acquisition programme is not simply to cater for immediate needs but to build a coherent and reliable collection over a number of years to meet the objectives and the services of a library.Acquisition is a very important aspect of librarianship since the strength of a libraryâ€™s collection solely depends on the information resources acquired. The acquisition librarians therefore have a tremendous role to play in maintaining a good collection as well as achieving organizational goals through acquisition of relevant information resources. If a library acquires good and relevant materials the benefits are enormous to both the library and the users, the library will have credibility and authority while the users will always find answers to their questions from such a library.The major source of acquisition is purchase, though information resources are also acquired through gifts and exchanges and legal deposit.
Importantly, because the legal researcher usually need to have the most up-to-date version of the law, as well as to be certain that an approved applicable case has not been overused by a higher court, or that a status has not been amended, repealed or found to be unconstitutional. Selection and acquisition of legal materials or publications becomes a necessity and rely on a variety of means for regular supplementation and up-dating.
In selecting and acquiring legal materials, problems like poor communication service, poor management of the library vote, poor quality of locally published books, inarticulate collection development policy etc are encountered. Both primary source materials such as Acts of parliament, Gazettes, Report of cases, Digest, volumes of statutes etc and secondary sources such as textbooks, casebooks, supplements, loose-leaf publications, encyclopedia, etc needs to be effectively and efficiently selected and acquired by qualified law librarians (Ali, Owoeye, & Anasi 2010) .