Monday, 02 April 2001	16:30 - 18:00	room 27	Parallel	Support & Services
Library and Information Literacy Services in Open and Distance Learning
Virkus, Sirje; Tallinn Pedagogical University; Estonia
areas: Universities and Higher Education issues: Quality; Barriers/Constraints; Partnerships/Alliances/Networks aspects: local/regional; institutional; virtual
Information seeking and use is an important part of the learning process and information literacy the essential component of lifelong learning. More and more information is available via electronic networks and learners must constantly be selective about how and what they learn in the "wired" environment; how they navigate the information maze, how they access and assimilate information they need. Libraries will be called upon to find innovative ways to support their learning. We are moving closer and closer to the vision that the centre of the physical and virtual campus of the future will be the library where electronic and traditional services will operate side by side and librarians or cybrarians, knowledge engineers, cyberdetectives, infonauts or how we call them will provide advice, assistance and tutoring to students. There are a lot of challenges for librarians and information professionals: how to establish a service for distance learners, what services are reasonable to provide and what services are not, how to improve the quality of services that we offer to distance learners, how to become a major partner in the ODL system, etc. Still, not a great deal of research attention has been given to the provision of information, orientation, advising, counselling, provision of library and administrative services, and the role that these interactions might play in a developmental or constructive model of learning. The Department of Information Studies of the Tallinn Pedagogical University carried out in the framework of the Estonian Science Foundation Grant the study about the role of digital libraries in a learning process. We tried to answer to the following questions: How much learner/teacher advice and support service is needed? How libraries can support distance learners? How should responsibility for the provision of support be organised, and what new collaboration between professionals might this entail, especially between information technology specialists, educators and librarians, etc. The paper examines the role of digital library in a new learning environment, the significance of library services in open and distance learning, the problems which students experience in accessing and using library services, etc. Topics covered in this paper include the results of the above mentioned research project and progress being made in offering services for remote students in Estonian libraries.