The Chief Librarians and the Education in Librarianship. A Questionnaire among Chief Librarians on their Opinions of the Education in Library and Information Science in Sweden

The aim of this thesis is to investigate what chief librarians in Sweden know about the present education in Library and Information Science and what opinions they have of it. We have used the following four questions as a starting point for our work: + How much do the chief librarians know about the education in Library and Information Science? + What are their opinions of the education? + What emphasis do they put on academic degrees and practical experience? + Are there any differences between various kinds of libraries regarding these issues? We decided to use questionnaires to gather our information. These were sent to 200 chief librarians on both public and research libraries all over Sweden. 151 of the questionnaires were answered. Besides the results and the analysis of these questionnaires our thesis contain a brief history of the education, with emphasis on the development from 1972 until today. We also give a presentation of the present education in Library and Information Science. Another part of the thesis consists of a short introduction to the theory of professions, which we use in the analysis of the results from the questionnaires. In general the chief librarians like the theoretical education of today, but a very strong majority want some form of practical experience to be included in the education. There are some differences between public and research libraries, and also some minor differences between public libraries of varying sizes. Ulrika Blomkvist och Helene Eklund vann SKTF:s uppsatsstipendium 2001 med ovanstående uppsats.Uppsatsnivå: