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The purpose of this paper is to explore concepts of professional education, development and training within the context of a changing information landscape

The paper analyses selected literature, including governmental and professional body reports, focusing particularly on the implications of these for the contemporary and future education, training and development of the information profession. Key issues addressed are the impact of the government skills agenda and the increasing use of competency based frameworks.

Evidence suggests that the information profession is undergoing a period of profound change in relation to its qualifications base. The paper concludes that many of the previously enshrined shibboleths of professional education, training and development are undergoing a fundamental re‐examination. Barriers relating to qualification levels, to professional practice and to career development, are being circumvented or demolished. In a volatile climate of rapid change, continuing professional development (CPD) is necessary if professionals wish to keep abreast of new skills and knowledge.

The paper identifies and discusses the current drivers for change in relation to the skills, competencies, education, training, and development, for the information profession, including issues in relation to defining “professionalism”. As a contribution to contemporary debate on these issues, the paper should be of use to policy makers, practitioners, researchers and students.

Purpose – This chapter will utilize the apprenticeship model developed by the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching in their Preparation for the Professions series to study how American Library Association (ALA)-accredited Master of Library Science (MLS) programs could be reformed to better integrate the interests of educators with those of the practicing profession and the public they serve.

Design/Methodology/Approach – The Carnegie model uses three “apprenticeships” to distinguish the three areas professional education must address, labeled in this chapter as knowledge, practice, and identity. Each of these three areas is explored as it relates to the education of librarians, with an emphasis on what constitutes the general knowledge, skills, and identity of librarianship. Examples of how these three components could be integrated into an MLS program are given.

Findings – Current ALA-accredited MLS programs differ widely on the number and content of required courses. Applying the model developed in the other Carnegie studies to the field of library education yields a clearer vision for the professional education of librarians and to a reorienting of the educational experience students encounter in their MLS studies.

Originality/Value – Using examples from other professional education programs allows library educators to see the means by which a holistic education is achieved in other professions. The novelty of this approach is in the breakdown of the various components of a professional education program. The tripartite approach to professional education also provides a useful framework around which to build an MLS program.

The purpose of this paper is to provide an overview, including methodology and preliminary findings, of a current and ongoing doctoral research study of the impact of national library associations. The study uses the impact assessment framework provided by ISO16439:2014 Methods and procedures for assessing the impact of libraries.

If the professional associations supporting the profession are to become sustainable we need to understand the difference they make to the individual members of the profession, to the employers of those individuals and to the profession of librarianship. This study applies the framework provided by ISO 16439:2014 to the national library association environment to explore and gather evidence of impact. To align with the ISO model, impact is differentiated into impact on individuals; social impact – institution (library or employing organization); and social impact – community (the profession). Preliminary findings show evidence of impact in all categories.

Data were gathered through semi-structured interviews that were conducted with members of national library associations in Australia, New Zealand, the UK and the USA during the third quarter of 2013.

This study contributes to research methodologies by testing the use of a qualitative assessment tool in a way that could be transferable to other associations both within and external to the library environment and to enable it to be adapted more broadly for other purposes within the library and information environment.

There has been much discussion in the past two decades about the need for the library profession to change. The prophets of doom and gloom have spoken loudly about the profession's lack of relevance and the consequence of this irrelevance. Many have taken notice – marketing campaigns have been introduced, technologies put in place, measures established, etc. All these activities have made some improvements to services but the reality is that is tinkering at the edges rather than taking the giant steps that are actually needed. By investigating the profession's past this paper aims to provide some insight in how to rebuild relevance of the profession i the digital environment.

The challenge is to find a way in which the core skills and competencies of the profession can be shown to add value to work regardless of the context in which they are demonstrated. These skills and capabilities revolve around content; how it is created, how it used, stored, managed, accessed and utilised in order to contribute to an ever‐increasing global body of knowledge. The wider environments in which people work often fail to recognise the complexities of this cycle, and the contribution that the information professional makes to keeping accessible, relevant information available from the desk top. Big decisions whether they be company acquisitions, research methodologies or clinical trials cannot be made without appropriate content. Why then are the content managers, the information professionals, under threat? Are there new skills and capabilities required by information professionals to build value in the content industry that continues to revolutionise?

Libraries need to implement a structure that will allow them to sell, deliver and communicate value. It is time to position the profession as a central player in the digitised information landscape.

The paper provides a high level view articulating what needs to be done for the Information Professional to take their place in the brave new information rich world.

Discusses issues relating to professional development and manpower training in Kenya. Provides background information on the libraries and information sciences training programmes situation. Gives attention to issues and trends affecting the information profession in training, curricula development, application of information technology, cost of information materials and the crisis in supply and demand in regard to manpower development in the information profession. Suggests that institutions for training information professionals need to observe the supply and demand trends in their environment and to adjust both the curricula and intake of trainees to the national situation. The training institutions also need to broaden the courses offered in their programmes to include computer skills, communication studies, economics of information, marketing, research methodologies, management, publishing and booktrade, resource sharing and continuing education. The market for information professionals needs to be provided with products with diversified knowledge and skills. Concludes with observations on how the problems of manpower development and training in information sciences in Kenya may be handled.

The workplace is a context of increasing interest in information literacy research, if not necessarily the most visible (Cheuk, 2017). Several studies have described contextual, relationship-based experiences of this subjective, knowledge-development focussed phenomenon (Forster, 2017b). What research contexts and methods are likely to be most effective, especially in workplaces which contain professions of widely differing ontologies and epistemological realities? The paper aims to discuss these issues.

An analysis and description of the value and validity of a “qualitative mixed methods” approach in which the thematic form of phenomenography is contextualised ethnographically.

This paper describes a new research design for investigation into information literacy in the workplace, and discusses key issues around sampling, data collection and analysis, suggesting solutions to predictable problems. Such an approach would be centred on thematic phenomenographic data from semi-structured interviews, contextualised by additional ethnographic methods of data collection. The latter’s findings are analysed in light of the interview data to contextualise that data and facilitate a workplace-wide analysis of information literacy and the information culture it creates.

Insights from recent research studies into information literacy in the workplace have suggested the possibility of an epistemologically justifiable, qualitative mixed methods design involving an ethnographic contextualisation of a thematic phenomenographic analysis of the information culture of an ontologically varied and complex workplace – with the potential for descriptive contextualisation, categorisation and generalisability.

The paper, based on the findings of the Library and Information Commission (LIC) report on Cross‐sectoral Mobility in the LIS Profession, considers some of the barriers to career development within the Library and Information Services profession. It focuses specifically upon difficulties experienced by LIS professionals in moving to different sectors of the profession. It discusses issues such as professional segregation; employer prejudice; poor employment strategies; lack of confidence among LIS professionals; training; and lack of professional support. In addition to outlining some of the barriers to the career development of LIS professionals, the paper offers a number of recommendations for employers, professional bodies and LIS professionals that may help to alleviate many of these barriers.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the nature of professionalism within Library and Information Science (LIS) and in doing so draw comparisons with the education and medicine professions.

The paper provides a review of the extant literature from the three professions and gives a brief review of the theoretical constructs of professional knowledge using the work of Eisner and Eraut to explore knowledge types. It then relates these definitions to knowledge use within LIS, education and medicine, before examining the roles that professional associations have on the knowledge development of a profession. It concludes with a reflection on the future of professionalism within LIS.

The literature suggests a fragmented epistemological knowledge-base and threats to its practices from outside professions. It does, however, find opportunities to redefine its knowledge boundaries within the phronetic practices of LIS and in socio-cultural uses of knowledge. It finds strengths and weaknesses in professionalism within LIS and its practitioners.

This review provides a contemporary update to several earlier, related, works and provides useful context to current efforts to professionalise LIS by the Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals.

Considering the shortage of minority representation in the library profession, this paper aims to examine minority students' awareness of librarianship and investigates the impact of marketing academic librarianship to students at the campus' cultural centers as a recruitment method.

The paper analyses previous studies and provides results from a survey distributed to minority students at two of the cultural centers and at the Summer Research Opportunities Program, a program that prepares minority students for graduate studies.

Results indicate a connection between presentations to students about academic librarianship and their interest in pursuing the profession. Findings highlight students' lack of awareness of librarian job responsibilities and the findings also highlight students' preferred methods for continued mentorship and support.

More qualitative research would prove valuable to gain in‐depth feedback from students about their understanding of the library profession and what factors are most and least likely to attract them to the profession. A second paper is planned to investigate the number of students who pursued a library degree that attended one of these sessions.

The paper highlights a simple, affordable and replicable alternative to time‐intensive and heavily subsidized recruitment programs.

As the population becomes more diverse and patron needs change, the library profession, which is predominantly white, will need to diversify to reflect patrons' increasingly diverse needs.

Many large‐scale recruitment initiatives recruit minority students to academic librarianship. This paper describes a small‐scale and effective approach to minority student recruitment.

Many information professionals fear for the future of their jobs as a result of further IT implementation, corporate downsizing, outsourcing and other influences. However the author feels that prospects for the profession have never been better. Through the use of IT, the information profession will find a means dramatically to change the public perceptions of information professionals.