Faculty perception and practices in health sciences information literacy instruction in Tanzania

Abstract

This study assessed the information literacy (IL) instruction pe rceptions and practices of faculty at Muhimbili University of Health and Allied Sciences i n Tanzania. An online survey was distributed to all faculty members in five schools and one insti tute at MUHAS (235 in total) from 2011 to 2012, with a response rate of (34.5 percent). The study findings show a general support for IL development, and its importance in enabling students to do library- based research. To a large extent, faculty believed that the IL competencies of students, including their ability to find, use and evaluate information, was aver age at the lower levels (first and second year students), and improved at the upper levels (thir d year undergraduates, and all postgraduates). Although faculty usually asked their student s to conduct library research for their course assignments, students did not make suffici ent use of library due to inadequate IL skills. Although faculty did not often collaborate with l ibrarians in teaching IL, faculty believed that IL should be an independent, mandatory and credit ea rning course, and it should be taught by either a librarian only or undertaken collaborat ively by both instructors and librarians. Faculty also indicated having seen some impact on the improvement in their students’ research process after receiving library instructi on. Based on the survey results, the study recommends the following: Universities should embed IL prog rammes into institutions, and librarians should include IL in professional development courses for t eaching IL to faculty, use more proactive and interpersonal marketing strategy t o promote IL, conduct regular IL needs assessment, use a flexible pedagogical appro ach and participative, student- centred methods in teaching and developing IL curricula, and expand the sources in which IL articles are published.