Speaker
Description
Open Science paves a way for Open scholarship which in turn improves the quality of research, and encourages global research competitiveness. Various institutions of learning have identified with these open initiatives which include: open access, open data, open Institutional repository. Librarians as information custodians are in charge of the activities towards Open Science. The role of the librarian in Open Science is double faceted. The first is processeing, uploading and making information accessible to clients. The librarian equally trains the Faculty, staff , students and other researchers on how to maximize open information for more impactful research. They need skills to be able to do this effectively.
The University of Nigeria Nsukka has fared well in Open Science through some viable initiatives in the area of Open Institutional (OIR). The OIR in Nsukka which was established in 2008 had the aim of digitizing , processing and uploading about 500,000 research works. Even though much has been done in this regard, the achievement of greater output has been hindered by some challenges. Top among these is the issue of training. Digitization of theses and other local contents and uploading same to IR involves a lot of technical skills such as: digital literacy, self archiving skills, research data management, metadata creation, data mapping, research integrity and ethics, among others.
This paper intends to find out the extent to which these skills are impacted on the librarians. It will equally ascertain the factors that have hitherto hindered training and education of librarians for positive IR output. Finally, this work will proffer solutions for more viable trainings towards efficient Open Institutional Repository.
