Educational and vocational guidance and information services for the youth in public libraries

Abstract

The resutts of an investigation into the public library's role in the provision of educational and vocational guidance and information to the youtti and its tinks to the schoot and other career guidance service providers in South Africa are reported. The empirical study focused on public library services to the youth in general and to high school learners in particular The results showed that public libraries continue to provide separate user services to children but that separate provision is only made for teenagers and young adults in the case of targe pubtic libraries. Career-retated requests are frequently received from high schoot learners but inadequate resources affect the development of speciatised educationat and vocational guidance and information services (EVGtS) for them. Lack af cooperation between pubtic libraries, schoots and other career guidance service providers hinders the development of support networks for tearners. It is recommended that existing generat user services to the youth could be extended to introduce specialised EVGIS for high school teorners. Recommendations are made in respect of coltections. facilities, staff and funding.