Assessing The Freshers’ Experience and Perceptions on the Importance of Information Literacy Skills for Their Academic Success (Published)
The main objective of this paper is to determine the effects of demographic factors such as gender, age, and university on freshers’ experiences with information literacy skills. The current research adopts a cross-sectional survey design with participants from two universities. The study employed a stratified random sampling technique to select the sample size. The quantitative method through questionnaire was designed and used to assess and confirm whether freshers understand information literacy skills.The findings indicate that gender, age, and university affect freshers’ experiences with information literacy skills, meaning that there were no significant differences in the experience of information literacy skills across age, gender, and university among freshers. The findings also revealed that male respondents, 20-24-year-old respondents, and students from the Federal University of Health Sciences showed significantly greater experience with information literacy skills. The findings of this research provide support for the postulated hypotheses. Undergraduates in the early stages of their university education should be exposed to preliminary research activities by faculty members to enhance their experience and knowledge of information literacy, including copyright understanding and the ability to effectively cite and paraphrase existing knowledge to avoid plagiarism. This research highlighted on how IL transform university freshers into information-literate individuals who can locate, access, and use information resources ethically and effectively.
Keywords: FUHSA, SAZU, experience with ILS, freshers, information literacy skills, perceptions with ILS
Assessing Information Literacy Competencies of Fresh Students at Bauchi State University Gadau: Insights from the Library Environment (Published)
The purpose of this study is to understand the levels of freshers’ information literacy skills at Bauchi State University Gadau, Nigeria. This study was conducted using cross sectional survey research method A questionnaire developed was used for data collection, and the data were analyzed using descriptive statistics of percentages and frequencies that was described in chart formats. The target population in this study comprise of 3,236 freshers during the 2022/2023 academic session of Bauchi State University Gadau. Based on the simple random sampling method, the sample size is three hundred and forty-four (344) as determined by the statistical formulation provided by Yamane (1967). The findings showed that the freshers acquire information literacy skills during orientation, workshops or from course syllabus. the study also found that freshers at Bauchi State University Gadau do not have the proper understanding of the concept of information literacy and cannot identify credible sources of information. Thus, this study recommends that more formal training programmes concerning information literacy skills need to be integrated into freshers’ curriculum to support the students learning and can improve their understanding of the concept of information literacy skills.
Keywords: Information literacy, freshers, information literacy skills, understanding