I have to confess it has been a while I read a novel cover-to-cover, so when I caught a site of Accra Books and Things, I was both over-joyed and over-the-moon that at least there are bloggers out there who can write passionately about areas they work in.
I was particularly caught by the entry Are We Training for the 21st Century?, which took a critical look at the rather-lackadaisical attitude of the employees at the Department of Information Studies at the University of Ghana, as well as the antiquated methods employed by the Department:
On a more basic level, I got the impression, as we interacted, that a lot of the curriculum and the actual teaching being done at the Diploma level in the Dept of Information Studies is quite “conservative” and dare I say, a little “old-fashioned”? I am not saying that everyone should be using PowerPoint, or talking about blogs, but I do expect that students who are ultimately going to be working in some kind of customer service environment which is likely to be dependent on ICTs should have at least heard of some of the contemporary developments. I was also surprised to hear that there is actually a course in “library automation”, which is exactly the same heading for a course which I did thirty five years ago at the University of Ibadan. Are these students really being prepared to work in a 21st century environment?
It's rare to find, in this country, niche-bloggers who write about subjects and areas they work in. While there are a few around (and I will touch on them over the course of the next few weeks), the subject of books remains, in my view, a very important area that we need more blogging of.
Words are beautiful, and so are books. And we all need to do more reading!
But if you want insights by a librarian who can blog about the industry in Ghana, and equally prompt you to explore some classic books, then check out "Accra Books and Things" here: http://accrabooksandthings.wordpress.com/
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