A survey of the schools of library and information science in the GCC member nations

Abstract

This paper describes the situation of library and information education in the six member nations of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), located in the Middle East. Data were collected through a mailed instrument from six schools located in three countries of the region that offer degree programs. Five of the six programs are essentially undergraduate. Three schools reported that they were revising their curriculum and one school had recently completed the process. Little change in their curricula was noted in these schools. The student-faculty ratio in all the schools is satisfactory. Intake and dropout rates in four of the six schools are alarmingly high. Four of them are extremely deficient in technological resources. Little application of computing hardware, software, bibliographic utilities and automated systems was found in four of the six schools. There is a real paucity of monographic and periodical resources in the majority of schools. Fieldwork was found to be a norm as a graduation requirement in these schools. The findings can be generalized to a number of developing nations that have similar conditions of library and information education and employment markets.