LECTURERS’ ELECTRONIC INFORMATION RESOURCES RETRIEVAL SKILLS, USE, AND TEACHING EFFECTIVENESS IN PRIVATE UNIVERSITIES IN MONROVIA, LIBERIA

ABSTRACT

Lecturers are expected to use Electronic Information Resources (EIR) to improve their research and teaching. However, it is not certain if private universities lecturers are effective in their teaching work or not, or if the skills needed to retrieve EIR for teaching effectiveness are lacking as research has indicated that the use of EIR by lecturers generally depend on their ability to locate discrete knowledge elements. The study investigated lecturers’ EIR retrieval skills, use and teaching effectiveness in private universities in Monrovia, Liberia.

The survey research design was adopted in this study. The population of the study was the lecturers in the seven private universities in Monrovia with a population of 557, out of which four were randomly selected, with a sample size of 287 lecturers. The overall reliability test for the questionnaire was 0.85 Cronbach’s alpha (α). The Questionnaire titled “Lecturers’ electronic information resources retrieval skills, use and teaching effectiveness questionnaire” was the instrument used for data collection. Out of 287 copies of the questionnaire distributed, only 181 (63%) were retrieved, valid, and used for analysis. The data collected were analyzed using descriptive and inferential statistics, Linear Regression, and Correlation.

The study established that there were more male lecturers (156, 86%)) than female (25, 14%) in the private universities in Monrovia, Liberia. Most of the lecturers hold Master’s Degree (126, 70%), and few were Ph.D. Degree holders (17, 9%). The availability of EIR to lecturers was low because most lecturers did not have the retrieval skills, and only a few use them for teaching. The results of the hypotheses showed that: EIR retrieval skills contributed 93.1% of lecturers’ ability to use of EIR, and there was a significant relationship between EIR retrieval skills and EIR use (R2 = .931, P<.05).; The higher the lecturers’ retrieval skills of EIR, the higher their teaching effectiveness as indicated by (r = .822, p < .05), and there was a significant relationship between lecturers’ retrieval skills and teaching effectiveness; The use of EIR contributed 76.8% of the variation in lecturers’ teaching effectiveness, and EIR use significantly enhanced lecturers’ teaching effectiveness; EIR retrieval skills and use were joint predictors of teaching effectiveness of lecturers (F =307.419, p<.05), and analysis of coefficient of determination revealed that EIR retrieval skills and use jointly contributed 77.5% to the variation in teaching effectiveness of lecturers (R2 = .775, P<.05) positively.

The study concluded that when university lecturers had EIR retrieval skills, they could easily access EIR for teaching. The following recommendations were made based on the result of the findings: Private universities administrators in Monrovia should make available and encourage their lecturers to use EIR for teaching. They should provide training facilities for lecturers on the use of ICT and the use of EIR. In addition, the researcher would work with universities administrations and lecturers to promote the need and use of EIR for teaching and help train lecturers on EIR retrieval skills.

Keywords: Electronic information resources (EIR), EIR retrieval skills, Use of EIR, Use of EIR retrieval skills, teaching effectiveness, Private universities, Monrovia