Open Access to Knowledge: Perceptions of Librarians in Colleges of Education in South-East Nigeria

This paper examined the concept of Open Access and the perception of Librarians in Colleges of Education in South East Zone of Nigeria to Open Access publishing as a medium for delivery of quality Scientific knowledge and for assessing the publications of scholars to global knowledge. The study focused on the Federal and state Colleges of Education in the zone. This is made up of three Federal Colleges of Education and four State Colleges of education respectively. 55 Professional librarians in the seven colleges of education were surveyed. A questionnaire adapted from palmer, et al (2009) was used to collect data. From the survey carried out and the data collected from professional Librarians from the seven colleges of Education across the zone, findings showed that Professional Librarians in the Colleges of education in South East zone have positive perception of Open Access scholarly publishing, though their level of involvement in creating awareness and contributing to the development of Open Access at the time of this study was low. It was also discovered that most of the librarians are yet to understand the concept of Open Access. There is need for improvement in view of the potential benefit of Open Access for promoting the visibility of the research output of researchers in Colleges of Education. DOI: 10.5901/jesr.2013.v3n4p2