This is a longer version of the paper published in the conference proceedings. / Librarians of the 21st century have to prepare themselves for working in a networked environment and should acquire necessary skills such as leadership, exploiting information handling, communication, crisis management, team building and decision making, and so on. So, library professionals are in dire need to acquire relevant skills and expertise to track the world of information and become competent enough to serve in a digital culture. An attempt is made to project issues related to the LIS education in India and suggests some proposals in this respect based on routine features and experiences. The study proposes core elements of a curriculum and a vision of LIS education in India for the coming decade. The paper also stresses the need for revised course contents and allied challenges for readiness of Indian LIS education in the digital era.

Poster paper / The fast changing environment fueled by technology has caused a paradigm shift in the library and information science profession. While the traditional roles of the library and information professional in providing access to information continues to be important, the responsibilities of this group have extended beyond providing just access to helping in utilizing info in the right context at the right time. 'Knowledge' is considered to be the most valuable resource in organizations today. This implies not just access to info contained in documents but also implicit knowledge gained through human experience. Information professionals need to view themselves as performance support professionals.

This is a Plenary Session 3 presentation (of 34 slides) on Friday, January 14 at the ALISE 2005 Conference. John King argues that the LIS "anxiety discourse" has parallels in other disciplines and is in reality a crisis of opportunity. Strategies for making the best of the opportunity are presented. Editor's note: Some of the slides (in the presentation) need a TIFF decompressor to see the pictures embedded in them. The URL on the final slide for the essay version of the talk does not work; instead, the essay is attached as a Microsoft Word file (18 pages) and can also be downloaded from the alternative location below.

The authors respond to the issues presented in the article "Crying Wolf: An examination and reconsideration of the perception of crisis in LIS education," published in the same issue of the Journal of Education for Library and Information Science.

This PowerPoint file contains 21 slides and was presented in the 2005 ALISE Conference, Session 5.1 - Collaborative Projects between LIS Schools in Different Countries. This presentation calls for collaborative projects in LIS education between the U.S. and Latin American countries. By highlighting the necessity of cooperating with Latin American Library Schools, the presentation emphasizes the importance of enhancing the quality of the LIS classrooms. It describes steps toward establishing mutual collaborations and points to some issues in the conduct of the projects.

This is a PowerPoint presentation (33 slides) on Wednesday January 12, 2005 in Session 4.2: Electronic Resources: Current Practices, Employer Expectations, and Teaching Strategies, sponsored by the Technical Services Education SIG at the 2005 ALISE Conference, Boston, MA. In order to prepare entry-level catalogers and offer cataloging-related courses, this research identifies the technical skills and competencies that a student should possess for entering the library world. It reviews 495 position announcements for catalog librarians from September 1, 2000 and August 31, 2003 and presents some useful observations. By evaluating the findings, this research makes suggestions to the development of a core curriculum in cataloging education.

Education for library profession is a revolutionary process. The core of the curricula is the people in relation to the information itself and technology that enable the provision of this information. There is a need to produce library science graduates with sophisticated management and policy and planning skills and the vision to translate core values of today and tomorrowâ s information world. Due to the ongoing developments in information technology sector, the information professionals trained in the latest information handling techniques would also become obsolete after a short time. Hence, the curricula must be reviewed constantly to determine whether the changes are in tune with the present and future job requirements.

This presentation has 14 slides and was given at the 2005 ALISE Conference, Session 1.1 - The Pedagogies of Library and Information Science Distance Education Programs. It introduces Syracuse University's experience in the development and application of distance education. The presentation reviews how distance education has been incorporated into the regular curriculum at Syracuse, and talks about the appropriateness of managing residence and non-residency programs. According to the author, distance education should be handled as an integrated part of the university community. The author also identifies the directions for future development of distance education.

The purpose of the present study is to determine, by building a model that predicts a judgment of perceived quality, what the profession means by "perceived quality of schools of library and information science." The study examines quantifiable characteristics of two groups of library schools: those ranked in both of Herbert S. White's perception studies and those not ranked in both. Multiple regression and discriminant analysis were used to build a model that showed clear differences between the two groups of schools. On the basis of several variables that define aspects of a program's size, finances, age, leadership, and rigor, the analysis showed that ranked and unranked schools form two mutually exclusive groups whose membership can be predicted with better than 98 percent accuracy. It also showed the perceived quality of a school's master's degree (M.L.S.) program is associated with the following variables, listed in decreasing order of importance: the half-life of the school's doctoral graduates, its budget and outside income, its age, its faculty's productivity, and the number of its students.

This pdf presentation (20 slides) was presented in Session 4.4 â Special Information Agencies and Issues (Juried Papers), at the 2005 ALISE Conference. It highlights the need for information professionals in museums and summarizes the results of a survey that investigated the composition of museum professionals in terms their training, experience, and expectations. It identifies the problems and potentials of information technologies for museums, and the presentation underlines strategies for developing the LIS curriculum to train students with necessary skills.