| Abstract: |
Czech universities and other institutions have at their disposal a set of
high-quality online information services. However, most potential student users usually are not aware of the size of
such databases. Adding the widely held (mistaken) assumption, that „everything can be found on the Internet“, why should
they use other sources, after all? No surprise the usage statistics show the low usage of these sources not
corresponding with their purchase price and the justified persuasion of librarians about their quality.
Librarians are actively trying to change this situation e.g. by active calls to the academic community of their
universities (however, the only impact is in a department meeting report), creating detailed user manuals etc.
I will be arguing, that the usage will not significantly increase, unless the users will see the value of these
sources for their own study and work. It is necessary to show them („killer applications“) sources they would look
for very long time in printed sources, they would find on the Internet only with high effort, in unverified form or
not at all. I will show a few such examples.
Training of end-users requires co-operation of librarians and specialists in respective fields, or better, training
of such specialists, who can include online sources in their teaching and work. Such specialists are in a better
position to identify useful functions and sources for their field. At the end I demonstrate, that without mastering
basic information skills (such as verifying the information, correct source citations) even the best online source
will only spice up student papers with foreign words and sources, but would not bring significant usage change
projecting in the quality of student papers and in result also increase in quality of the whole educational
process.
This presentation builds on author’s experience with teaching online sources in informatics courses and co-operation
with librarians from Center of Information and Library Sources in teaching a course in information processing skills
at the University of Economics Prague. |
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