HE LOW LIBRARY USAGE BY UNIVERSITY
STUDENTS: A CASE ON ZIMBABWE OPEN UNIVERSITY
MIDLANDS REGIONAL LIBRARY, GWERU, ZIMBABWE

HE LOW LIBRARY USAGE BY UNIVERSITY
STUDENTS: A CASE ON ZIMBABWE OPEN UNIVERSITY
MIDLANDS REGIONAL LIBRARY, GWERU, ZIMBABWE

MTHOKOZISI MASUMBIKA NCUBE

The Zimbabwe Open University Midlands regional library acts as a back bone for the Zimbabwe
Open University Midlands Region, as it has in place resources and services meant to cater for
the diverse library needs of its stakeholders, at the same time encouraging extensive study habits
and life-long learning. However, there is a very low usage of library resources and services by
the university students. Therefore this pragmatic research intended to establish the reasons
behind this low usage and recommend measures that can be taken to increase the student’s use
of the library, through the use of a case study research design. The study used semi-structured
questionnaires, semi-structured interviews, observations and document analysis to collect data.
The study identified that some of the resources within the library did not meet the needs of the
students, and also that the library was inconveniently located, thus making it difficult for most
students to visit and use the library. Therefore, for the library to be deemed relevant, the
research recommends that relevant resources be acquired in the library. Also the research
recommends that the library be relocated to a more strategic position, to enable maximum
utilization by students

IJRSS

2015