Availability and use of public secondary school libraries in Minna, Niger State, Nigeria

Abstract

The study examined the availability and use of school library facilities and information resources by public secondary schools students in Minna, Niger State. Questionnaire was used as an instrument for data collection and simple percentage distribution was used to analyze the data collected. The study showed that facilities such as tables (59.25%), book shelves (70.33%) were adequate but catalogue and computers had high percentage of inadequacy (75.99% and 70.23% respectively). The study also revealed that library resources which include dictionaries,  handbooks, manuals (65.88%) and textbooks (51.74%) were use to read in preparation for examination (80.3%). The study  recommended that school management should improve library facilities and resources, acquire more computers and employed trained librarian to manage the library and a mechanism to enforce the policy that requires each school should have a standard library.