Digital Library Education in Europe: A Survey

Abstract

Research in digital libraries (DLs) has gained much interest across the globe. Most funding related to DL are available for building DLs, rather than producing digital librarians by developing the DL curricula and offering necessary funding to introduce state-of-the-art DL labs for future library professionals. Based on online surveys, this article investigates the status of DL education/courses in Europe, particularly, it examines the curriculum contents of DL courses, explores the future direction of library and information science (LIS) curricula, and identifies the competitors of LIS schools in the DL world. This study received responses from 54 LIS schools/departments in 27 European countries. The results of the current study clearly show that the majority of the LIS schools have already integrated digital librarianship in their regular bachelor’s and master’s degree programs. The importance of practical aspects in DL curricula has been highlighted by the authors. The study also reports the recommended books and journals on DL, direction of LIS curricula, and the competitors of LIS schools in the digital world. A number of future research directions have been offered by the authors. The authors expect that the study will contribute to the discussions and debates toward identifying subject elements for DL courses. The top subject areas based on their importance as reported by the participants of the current study should be taken into consideration before designing curricula for DLs and before developing a Europe-wide unique LIS curriculum.