Education in Information Science

Information science encompasses many notions, ideas, concepts, principles, and techniques. It relates symbols, words, and language to the world about us. It permits us to hypothesize about the structure of the universe, forecast about future events, and extend knowledge. Information is dynamic, and its rate of growth demands of us that scientific methods and technology be applied to deal with this problem or it will be virtually impossible to meet the demands it imposes on our society. To meet this challenge, trained professional personnel are needed. The universities have the responsibility of preparing such manpower. The career opportunities exist for information scientists, information systems analysts and designers, and professional staff in information transfer, and the demands for experts are increasing. The important question is, are our programs and our curricula in the universities accomplishing this mission? The probability is that many of these programs could be improved substantially. It is our responsibility to examine these programs and analyze this data, which should indicate to us the degree to which our mission is being accomplished. We should be able to provide guidelines that would be useful to individual institutions in reviewing their own programs.