Dear Sir,

 Many thanks for your mail.

    I appreciate your thoughts and am of the opinion that the syllabus will make a huge difference in solving the recent problems. A strict course curriculum and evaluation will make a candidate to think which profession he/she wants to join.

 I have the following suggestions to make:

 The 12 month BLIS/MLIS course should be spread over for a period 16 months with 4 months of compulsory internship in a reputed Library. Theme-oriented assignments/project should be introduced as soon as possible. More emphasis should be given on Computer courses - Online Resources, how to create and maintain a website but not on what is 'CPU' and what is 'mouse'?

 The LIS correspondence courses should have a minimum 5 – 6 months compulsory class on weekends failing which student will not be able to write the examination. The correspondence course should also have theme oriented project/assignments as part of their course structure.

 The 2 year and 5 year MLIS programes will help in developing standard of LIS education in India. Why not have 5 year BA. LIS or BSc. LIS etc etc... equivalent to Bachelors Degree (in 5 year law prog. it  is BA LLB or BSc LLB and after that LLM). This will help to standardize the education in LIS and have specific course structure. This will also help an individual to specialize in one subject area.

       Sir, department-wise, the Library is the only department where you have more no. of people. If you look at other departments, be it teaching or non-teaching, the no. of staff is less. Yet LIS professionals are facing difficulties in getting jobs. A slight improvement in the pattern of LIS syllabus will help a lot.

With warm regards,

Sree Kumar Nair,

SLCU,

Bangalore - 29