This research assumes that administrative and infrastructural factors may explain the low use of educational support systems (ESS) for teaching by library and information science (LIS) educators in Nigerian universities. The literature has focused on the adoption of different types of educational technologies and their use by teachers and students with little consideration for the LIS educators’ actual use of ESS for teaching and the effect of institutional support on the use of these systems. Thus, the study seeks to determine the user percentage of ESS for teaching, how the educators actually use ESS for teaching, the nature of administrative and infrastructural support they receive while teaching with ESS and whether the two factors correlate with and predict the actual use of ESS for teaching. A descriptive survey design was adopted and data were collected through a questionnaire. The results indicate that many of the LIS educators did not use ESS for teaching and that their actual use of ESS for the instructional activities highlighted in the study was low and below average. Moreover, the educators were found to have received minimal administrative and infrastructural support. The two factors were also found to have significant positive correlations and a significant and positive joint influence on the actual use of ESS for teaching with a joint contribution of 14.7%. Analysis of their relative contributions to the prediction of actual use revealed that, although the two support factors contributed positively, only infrastructural support contributed significantly at 0.05 level of significance. It was therefore recommended that for administrative support to be meaningful, adequate infrastructural facilities should be provided for an appreciable and sustainable use of ESS for teaching.

Information and Communications Technologies (ICTs) integration for teaching is the application of information, communication and telecommunication technologies, equipment and hardware for instructional purposes. With ICT, a lot of information resources and software can be provided on time and with ease. The research presumed that the perception of how useful for teaching (or otherwise) the ICTs are may affect their use among library educators in Nigerian universities. To establish or refute this, descriptive survey design was adopted and the population is 293 educators engaged in 27 universities. All the educators participated in the study. Out of the 293 copies of the questionnaire distributed, 211 copies were returned of which only 208 copies were found useful giving a response rate of 72%. The scales: Extent of Use (r = 0.883) and perceived usefulness (r = 0.959) were used to collect data which was analysed using descriptive and inferential statistics to answer two research questions and test an hypothesis at 0.05 level of significance. Perceived usefulness was found to be negative. Analysis of its influence on the extent of use of ICT for teaching showed significant correlation (r = 0.174; p>0.05). This implies that the library educators perceived ICT not useful for teaching LIS courses and that the extent they will go in using ICT was dependent on how useful they perceived ICT. This may explain the low use of ICT for teaching among them. Therefore, training and support programmes should be designed to encourage a positive perception and an increase use of a wider range of ICTs for quality and effective teaching practices.

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This is a review of the extant literature on inhibitors to the electronic teaching and learning of Library and Information Science (LIS) in Nigerian universities. The university-wide inhibitors as identified by the study are non-provision or inadequacy of: funding, administrative and infrastructural supports, functional ICT laboratories/tools, ICT-compliant teaching staff and standby and responsive technical support for both teachers and students. Library schools' inhibitors include poor maintenance culture, lack of Internet presence, dedicated bandwidth and active websites while the teaching and learning inhibitors highlighted by the study are (older) teachers' poor attitude, concerns on how to retain the copyright of their lecture contents, plagiarism and the quality of students' work; fear of additional workload which may result in stress and burnt-out; lack of freedom or teaching autonomy (as teaching may now take the collaborations of colleagues, computer experts and instructional/graphic designers); teachers'/students' poor expertise and technology background and nature of course, among others. The author made suggestions on the way forward for an increased and a sustainable integration of ICTs in teaching and learning, especially in this Post-COVID-19 Pandemic Era where physical contact and interactions may need to be reduced to the barest minimum to contain contagious communication and consequent health hazards. This review has implications for library educators, students and educational managers in the universities of other developing countries.

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