Curricula in information science: Analysis and development

Jack Belzer, Akkanad Isaac, Eugene Finkelstein and James Williams

Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 1971, vol. 22, issue 3, 193-223

Abstract: The Curriculum Committee of the Special Interest Group/Education Information Science of ASIS is charged with the responsibility for determining the scope and characteristics of information science programs in the U.S. & Canada in terms of curriculum developments and course offerings. To fulfil this responsibility, questionnaires were developed to elicit reliable information concerning courses being offered relating to information storage and retrieval, information science and/or documentation. The data requested included course levels, pre‐ and post‐requisite courses, textbooks used, topics covered, frequency with which offered, etc. Responses were received from 45 schools, providing information about 185 courses and 242 topics. Using several methods of clustering the data, it was difficult to arrive at firm results, because of the diversity and scatter of the topics included in this field. It was therefore decided to hold a workshop of experts which would examine the validity of the questionnaire results. This workshop, using the Delphi technique to arrive at consensus, was held at the University of Pittsburgh on September 21–23, 1970. Sixteen specialists in the field representing universities, industry and government were brought together to participate. Consensus was reached in identifying nine factors which contribute to the curriculum in information science and seven courses which constitute the core for the Master's program. The topics to be included in each of these courses were also isolated. The 9 factors are: Psychology/Behavioral Science, Language/Linguistics, Management, Statistics, Library Science, Systems, Mathematics, Information and Communication Theory, and Computer Science/Automata. The 7 courses are: Introduction to Information Science, Systems Theory and Applications, Mathematical Methods in Information Science, Computer Organization and Programming Systems, Abstracting/Indexing/Cataloging, Information and Communication Theory, and Research Methods. The topics relating to these courses are given in Appendix III. Not all the objectives have been attained. The “meat” surrounding the core has not yet been supplied; the core for a Doctoral program must also be determined. The committee feels that some conventions for evaluating the levels of professionalism reached at the completion of such programs could result as a byproduct of ths study.

Date: 1971
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