Investigating the Readiness of University Libraries of Isfahan for Encountering the Coronavirus (COVID -19) Pandemic

Deadly outbreak of Corona virus in the late 2019 is the main challenge for human society. The pandemic of dangerous and highly contagious virus in addition harmed businesses and jobs and also caused serious harms to the field of science. Libraries as cultural and social institutions which are responsible in providing information have special place in field of crisis management and because of the type of services of libraries that associated with in-person users, many libraries have closed at the same time during pandemic of this virus, but many university libraries reopened in short break again and started their activities. Of course, this reopening has doubled concern for managers, librarians and users about readiness of university libraries in facing and dealing with this virus. Due to type of libraries and characteristics of users’ community and different culture and necessary facilities, libraries are so various therefore the decisions and type of services are so different. So, this survey decided to investigate the readiness of university libraries in Isfahan during the epidemic of coronavirus and the effect on the current activities and measure and decision taken against this virus.

This research was done by survey method. The statistical population was staff in university libraries of Isfahan city including Isfahan University of Technology, Isfahan University, Isfahan University of Medical Science, Isfahan University of Art, Malek Ashtar University of Technology, Azad University branch of Khorasgan, and Payam Noor University. Also, tool for collecting data are self-administrated questionnaire conformed by experts and professors of library science and its reliability was calculated by Cronbach’s alpha as .77. It used SPSS software version 26 and for confirmatory factor analysis used Amos software version 24 and to analysis data from descriptive statistic and drawing graph used one sample t-test with the level of .5.

According to the information obtained from findings of the current survey, it was determined that weighted average of the total score of the answers given to questions which is related to the level of readiness of university libraries in facing the crisis of the COVID-19 disease amounted to 66.66%. It showed the readiness of libraries is good and above average. The highest score which indicates implementation of suggested solution in Isfahan libraries belong to requirement of using mask for users after that implementation of shift work and remote work are in the second place and auto renewal of resource is in the third place of public implementation of these methods at the Isfahan university libraries. Reducing working hours and enabling search, renewing and reserving resources and paying fine for late delivery electronically by the library software is located in fourth place with a smooth difference. But in the mentioned libraries, no attention was paid to disinfection of return sources and taking fever at the time of entry.

The state of readiness of investigated libraries is evaluated as optimal while pandemic of COVID-19 causes reduction in main activities of libraries. One of the main strength points of investigated libraries against this virus can be mentioned as the use of internet network infrastructure and use of web library software with proper ability which provides users with access to resource and document electronically without visiting in-person. While until to archive the proper point, infrastructure development and increasing level of digital literacy, improving media literacy skills, developing user's access to information resource, controlling the digital content, using multimedia resources and reducing digital gap need more attention. If this condition continues, it is strongly probably that libraries will have many changes in providing services and it will more often virtual and electronic therefore suggested that library manager providing suitable chance to share their creativity and innovation get from different various special areas in fighting against COVID-19 with other communities which are involved in this epidemic crisis. Also it is necessary to settlement infrastructure related to information and communication technology with the aim of transferring performance  services from tradition to online, choose mixed pattern, the need to allocated budget for libraries, obtain new skill by university librarian for supporting distance education and learning, correct information and reliability, holding  virtual reading meeting, increasing media literacy producing digital content and presenting services in virtual space platform, sharing information between users, preparing informative poster and etc. should be given more attention.