A Comparative Study Of Information Organization Course In Education Of Master Of Library Science Between China And America

In the age of diversification of information resources, information organization technology and information organization environment, information organization teaching faces enormous challenges, such as teaching obsolete content, ignoring technical education as well as lacking information resources sharing. In this study, a comparative study of information organization course in education of Master of Library Science between China and America is done to find the differences between China and America, and then give suggestions to improve the information organization curriculum setting of graduate, train professionals to adapt to the development of the digital age.In this study, Library Science graduate courses related to information organization of eight universities that includes University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, University of Washington and Syracuse University in America, and Wuhan University, Nanjing University, Renmin University of China, Peking University in China are investigated, and the research contents include profiles of information organization(course name, course nature, credits, teaching content, teaching methods, teaching materials) and overview of information organization teachers.By analyzing, there are some same points as following:(1) Courses:the required courses and elective courses mode; teaching content are extensive as well as combined traditional and new knowledge and assessment includes many sections; teaching in the form of lectures and discussions:no fixed teachine materials (2)Teachers:teachers’ professional background are relatively rich, and a large number of teachers have doctorates; the title structure shows optimized; teachers’ research fields are multiple.Differences are the following:(1) the amount of courses in America is higher than those in China,and the technical courses have a larger proportion in America; (2) American education pays attention to personal and practical education and teach the frontiers of knowledge, but Chinese education pays attention to to acquired and general knowledge; (3) curriculum in America are hierarchical, more flexible while curriculum in China keep stable; (4) distance education and the usage of relevant teaching platform and software in America makes information resources sharing to be true, while China is currently lacking this; (5) the course in America requires a lot of reading materials, while China is rare of the requirement of reading materials; (6) transparency of website information in American college is high, while the Chinese website is opposite; (7) the total number of teachers in Amenrica is higher than that in China; many teachers of American college have more professional background, while a larger number of teachers in China have single professional background; the research fields of Amenrican teachers are broader than those of Chinese teachers.According to the analysis presented above,there are some recommendations:to transparent teaching information; to strengthen the teaching staff; to reform teaching methods and adjust teaching content.