The role of digital scholarship in academic libraries, the case of university of cape coast: opportunities and challenges

Abstract

PurposeThe purpose of the study is to assess the role of academic libraries in digital scholarship at the University of Cape Coast. The study adopted the descriptive survey design and used teaching staff (lecturers) as the population of the study.Design/methodology/approachA sample size of 278 was used for the study. The study used questionnaires to obtain data from participants. The study revealed that faculty members appreciate digital scholarship through the services offered by Sam Jonah Library are relevant to the current higher education context, reliable information, preservation of information resources and facilitating the integration of library services into the learning process are closely integrated into the library service, transform scholarly communication, teaching and learning style and research paradigm.FindingsThe study revealed that digital scholarship contributes to faculty members' delivery at the University of Cape Coast through the provision of information literacy training for new students, provision of reference lists of materials available in the library and provision of lists of new materials. The study revealed that faculty members face inadequate facilities to enhance digital scholarship, inadequate open access to reading materials (articles, books, etc.), inadequate platforms or suite of tools for librarians to take faculty.Practical implicationsThe application of digital scholarship provides an expansion to the core competitiveness of librarians new services which enables innovativeness and transformation of libraries. Students will be equipped with digital literacy skills; it affords instructors to approach teaching with innovation and scholars are also engaged to perform novel practices in scholarship acquisition. Digital scholarship is the umbrella under which all academic technologies comes under to foster collaboration and better learning experience.Originality/valueThis paper offers an insight of the role digital scholarship in promoting and advancing scholarship in the academic environment. It highlights a number of digital scholarship platform available in the library. It is observed that digital scholarship practices must be encouraged in the library because it facilitates the role of academic library which is to support teaching, learning and research.