Employment practices of student library assistants in academic libraries in KwaZulu-Natal

Abstract

Employing student library assistants (SLAs) has been a time-honoured tradition of academic libraries. In the library, SLAs help to staff the circulation desk during hours when librarians are not available, to answer directional or reference questions and to carry out special projects that benefit the library in various ways (Wu 2003: 141). SLAs also benefit from working in the library, not only through financial gain, but university libraries are the best training grounds for the development of their personal and professional competencies. The purpose of the study was to compare the overall employment practices of student library assistants (SLAs) in academic libraries in KwaZulu-Natal (KZN). The research project is intended to provide an understanding of the factors that affect the selection and recruitment of SLAs, their hours of work and the rate of pay. This study used the survey method as the data collection method. Two sets of questionnaires were designed for two types of respondents, namely student library assistants as well as their supervisors. The information was extracted from the questionnaires and presented in the form of graphs and tables. The study revealed that many academic libraries follow a similar pattern when selecting and recruiting student library assistants; however, issues such as duration of training provided to SLAs, and having a library guide prepared for students, tend to differ. The research findings could contribute towards assisting academic libraries in improving their service delivery and achieving their organisational mandate. Recommendations and suggestions where differences were discovered are shared.