Abstract:
The study was carried out to trace and document the history of agency involvement in the development of primary school libraries in Southeast Nigeria over a thirty year period. It looked at the contribution of agencies during the period of 1980 to 2010 and, it looked at the successes and the factors that limited the agencies efforts. In carrying out this research work, five research questions guided the study, which adopted historical design. The accessible population of this study comprises fifteen agencies in the five states of Southeast involved in the development of Primary school libraries during the period. Purposive sampling technique was used in getting twenty respondents who made up the sample size for this study. The instruments used for collecting data were documents and structured interview. The examination of archival documents was apt as it has to do with events that occurred in the past, while key players who worked or are still working in the agencies identified were interviewed. The results of the study showed that professional associations were very active in the 1980s to early 1990s. The activities that were in place then were awareness campaigns, training of teacher librarians, placing of jingles, lobbying of government and collaboration with other agencies. This helped in getting to the grassroots of library development but their activities dwindled from about 1990. It was found that government agencies took the lead in library development from the late 1990s but were not as effective as the professional associations and other informal agencies. Again, the study revealed a regression in school library development in later period when the professional association’s activities dwindled. In view of these, it was recommended that the spirit of professionalism be reawakened by revitalizing professional associations as the study has revealed that it worked in the past and will still work again if tried. It was recommended that public libraries should be revitalized so that the supportive role they played in the past is used again. Other recommendations were made and finally, areas for further research were suggested by the researcher.
