The aim of this master´s thesis is to analyse what factors have an impact on the quality of school libraries. The research questions are: How do some school principals, school librarians and school inspectors view quality in school libraries and what has an impact on quality?How do they view some existing quality criteria?How important do they think the integration of the school library into the curriculum is?The theoretical approach is derived from research about school libraries by David Loertscher and by Sharon Markless and David Streatfield. The empirical material has been collected through half structured qualitative interviews. The informants chosen are principals and school librarians from three Swedish primary schools (6-15 years). The schools are chosen because their libraries have been awarded the title school library of the year. Two school inspectors have also been interviewed. Some of the aspects of quality that both the research literature and the interviews show as important factors are cooperation and collaboration between school librarians and teachers, learning by ICT and students' information literacy. The investigation shows that earlier research is valid for this thesis also. The views of the informants are that school libraries can play a vital role in schools. The investigation confirms the importance of support from principals and of evaluation of your work, by the help of school inspections and existing quality criteria.

In these days we can witness a growing number of combined school and public libraries in Sweden. It can be explained as an economy measure or as an attempt to develop the library work. The aim of this thesis is to picture how working in combined libraries affects high school librarians’ own apprehensions of their professional identity. The results are based on in-depth interviews made with four high school librarians, working not only towards the students but also the public. By using a hermeneutic method, my attempt has been to construe the interviewee’s remarks and in that way analyse how the librarians themselves apprehend their professional roles and identities. The theories of the Danish library and information scientists Anders Ørom and Trine Schreiber have been used as analysis tools. A comprehensive summary of already existing studies in this field of interest is given, and is to be considered as a framework to which this thesis’ results are to be seen. The empiric data reveal several different opinions, and by using the theories of Ørom and Schreiber I have made the following conclusions. Two professional identities have been indicated; the teaching school librarian and the traditional cultural intermediary librarian. They both seem to include a strong feeling of service-mindedness. In addition, a third tendency to an indistinct and split identity can be perceived. Despite the lack of conformity that this third identity suggests, the interviewees give the expression that the two main identities cooperate and enrich one another.

The aim of this Master’s thesis is to examine and understand how teachers of younger children view the concept of critical evaluation of information and how their interpretations of the concept relate to their teaching. The need for the development of children’s ability to critically evaluate has been emphasized through research as well as the need for collaboration between teachers and librarians in order to help pupil’s process information into knowledgeThe study has a socio-cultural perspective and the material was collected through observations and qualitative interviews with teachers. The results of the study indicate that many teachers experience uncertainty when it comes to the area of critical evaluation and that they do not teach the subject to any substantial extent. Although there is a new curriculum which clearly raises the question, the issue of critical evaluation is paid comparatively little attention by the teachers. There are, however, teachers who express an interest in the subject. Generally, the teachers think of the critical evaluation of a source as a way to decide what to believe, but other aspects can be distinguished. Some speak about critical evaluation as attitude towards information. A potential way of incorporating critical evaluation into teaching is, according to the teachers, to have a continuing dialogue around the subject with the children.It is likely that teachers need further education within the area of critical evaluation in order for a method development to take place. / Program: Bibliotekarie

The aim of this study is about how school librarians useweblogs as a working tool. I wanted to examine how someschool librarians use weblogs as a working tool and why theyare using them. I also wanted to know the advantages anddisadvantages they see with this tool. I believe that children andteenagers are interested in social media- tools and also are bigusers and consumers of these tools. Therefore I thought it mightbe interesting to examine how school librarians who havechildren and young people as their main target group, work withweblogs which is one of many social media tools.The methodology used for this study is interviews. I didthree face-to-face interviews and two interviews by sending theinterview guide with questions to the participants. The interviewguide was sent by e-mail as a wordfile-document. The answerswere written by the participants directly in the word-documentand then sent back to me in the same way. Farkas (2007) dividethe use of weblogs into different kinds of blogs. I used thisdivision to present and analyze my result.The conclusions of this study are that school librarians useweblogs as News Blogs, Readers’ advisory blogs, Book Clubblogs, Marketing blogs, Blogs to build community, Blogs tosupplement workshops and as reference blogs. They useweblogs as a working tool to inform, to market the library, toreach out to their users, to tip about books etc. Some of theadvantages of weblogs according to my respondents are itssimplicity, its rapid way to disseminate information on and itsability to allow users to participate and communicate. Some ofthe disadvantages of weblogs as a working tool are that it takestime to blog, it’s hard to get readers and that there are fewpeople who give comments on the blog. / Program: Bibliotekarie

The purpose of this Bachelor’s thesis was to explore how principals and school administrators work to develop their school libraries. To narrow our area of study we chose to only include gymnasiums run by the municipality and conducted four semi-structured interviews with two principals and two heads of upper secondary school. We formulated two questions: (1) what perceptions of the school library and its functions can be found among our four respondents? And, (2) how do they work with developing the school library? As a theoretical framework we used Loertscher’s taxonomy of the school leader. The results from our interviews indicated that our respondents have a broad view of what role a library can play in the school, but mainly they wanted it to be an information center. How much they sought to develop the library ranged from not at all to very much. It seemed to depend on personal interest, authority, money, time and a librarian’s willingness to cooperate. The librarians and teachers also needed time to improve the cooperation. / Program: Bibliotekarie

The purpose of this Master’s thesis is to examine student secondaryteachers’ perceptions of the role of the school library libraries aswell as compare results with an earlier study. The followingquestions were posed:1. How do student teachers view the school library?2. How do student teachers view the role of the school library inschool and for school work?3. How do student teachers expect to use the library in education?Data was collected through qualitative semi-structured interviewsand analysed using Loertscher’s eight level taxonomy of schoollibraries. The results of the analysis of the empirical datashow that student teacher’s perceptions of library andinformation seeking are almost identical to views held by the studentteachers in Böwes study conducted 15 years ago. / Program: Bibliotekarie

This thesis deals with options about information technology in education, the starting pointbeing a project in progress, namely Ostindieprojektet. This is the first collaboration betweenDatatorget and Stadsmuséet in Göteborg. The research is built on a phenomenological approach.The "backbone" information is collected from qualitative interviews, conducted mainlyduring March-April 1995.The questions for the interviews deal with the opinions about the reasons with Ostindieprojektetand IT in education, what conditions required to complete Ostindieprojektet and the ITdevelopment, the availability of the material, how IT-use can affect education, possible qualitiesfor the student with IT-use and how IT-use can affect the role of the school-1ibrary as ateaching tool.Some key subjects examined in the thesis deals with governmental investigations, viewsabout pedagogic and knowledge, problem-based leaming, computer-based education and therole of the school-library. The research shows that the interviewers have the same opinionsas the above mentioned key subjects. In completing the thesis we hope we have created aforum for critical discussion.

The purpose of this essay is to examine progression in user education atprimary and secondary school levels, specifically the role played byschool libraries, librarians and strategy documents in securingeducational progression. Progression is examined in the user educationprovided by the five schools, part of the same municipal schoolmanagement area which share the same strategy plan. The area, NorraFäladen, was awarded School Library of the Year in 2011 for its work,making it particularly interesting for this essay's purpose. The studycombines interviews with the area's three school librarians, who dividetheir time between the five schools, with an analysis of the strategydocuments that regulate user education within Norra Fäladen. Theanalytical framework is based on: AASL's model of progression in usereducation (Standards for the 21st-century learner); Ekström's model forsuccessful and active strategy documents; Kuhlthau's theory of thelibrarian's role in the information search process; and Limberg'staxonomy of the role of the school library.The study shows how a number of concurrent factors and prerequisitesinfluence how goals for progression in user education are met. These are:clearly formulated joint goals which are adapted to local conditions andillustrate progression in a concrete plan of action, thus ensuring thatactivities are realised; a shared view of the importance of informationliteracy and how best to promote it; teacher and school librariancollaboration in user education and pedagogical development; and, activesupport from school leaders, who recognise the role of the school libraryin this work. / Program: Bibliotekarie

The purpose of this study is to examine the role social media canplay in a school library context, based on a theoretical model,called “A new model for the public library in a knowledge andexperienced society” by Henrik Jochumsen, Dorte Skot-Hansenand Casper Hvegaard Rasmussen.The bachelor thesis aim to answer three research questions, theyare as follow: Which request of social media is there by teachersand pupils at a high school library? Which social media is the mostrequested by teachers and pupils at a high school library? Andshould the library services for teachers and students be improved ifsocial media were used at a high school library?The methodology used for this study was an inquiry investigation.My findings are presented in a context of previous, relatedresearch and the study shows that teachers and pupils are wellinformed of what social media is and they use social media whenthey are at school.The thesis also shows that the unit I study, a vocational trainingunit, is more or less interested in what the school library can do forthem with social media.They seldom are at the school library and they seldom use theteach platform were they can find library services.This result can open up for the school library to meet the users at anew arena with for example social media. / Program: Bibliotekarie

This essay investigates the integration of the school library into teaching in one of Sweden’s senior high schools and the effects of the new education act which gives school libraries a stronger standing. A second purpose is to investigate teachers’ views on professional responsibility with regard to the development of information literacy. Through an email survey different aspects of library integration are investigated. The integration level is assessed according to the library taxonomy for teachers by David V. Loertscher. The results show that teachers do not use the school library to any great extent and only a small percentage has developed their library use after the reform. Although some teachers have increased their use of the library they still see it mainly as a source of material and do not see the school librarian as a resource for the development of new teaching methods. The studies limitation was that the survey was only answered by 34 %. The conclusion is that in order to improve the school libraries’ standing and higher levels of integration in line with Loertscher’s taxonomy, stronger support is needed from school management, principals and politicians as well as clearly assigned responsibilities and awareness of the school library’s potential as a learning resource. / Program: Bibliotekarie