Introduction
Data literacy is defined as “a specific skill set and knowledge base, which empowers individuals to transform data into information and into actionable knowledge by enabling them to access, interpret, critically assess, manage, and ethically use data” (Koltay, 2017, p. 10). It has become an important professional as well as civic skill necessary for functioning in the society of the 21st century (Nayek & Sen, 2015; Bowler, Acker & Chi, 2019). Data literacy has also become part of daily library programs designed for local community in effort to minimize the shortcomings of digital divide in society (Shafiq, Bhatti & Naeem, 2020). On the professional level, data literacy has become necessary in management of public libraries as directors’ decisions are frequently based on growing quantities of data collected during daily library operations. In addition to library programs for users and data managerial decision making based on data, public libraries have an opportunity to devise partnerships with data-sharing and data-using organizations and strengthen the perception about them as a key information hubs (Enis, 2020). This would make them interesting to users who want to become familiar with data literacy but don’t have a place or whom to ask about it.
Research
The paper presents results from the nation-wide empirical research study in public libraries in Croatia about recognition of the term data literacy and its characteristics. The paper also aims to contribute to the advancement of data literacy in public libraries in Croatia. Literature review showed that previous research studies worldwide have most frequently had their focal point on academic libraries while public libraries have been neglected in this matter. In Croatia there were no recent research studies in public libraries about data literacy. The goal of this research study is therefore to collect data about the data literacy and its recognizable characteristics. The hypothesis of the research study is that heads of public libraries are still not fully acquainted with the term data literacy, and they lack more thorough education about it. A questionnaire was chosen as the principal research non probabilistic quantitative method as it provided the ability to reach many respondents scattered over large geographical region. It was distributed by e-mail to heads of all public libraries officially registered at the National and university library in Zagreb. The results of the research indicated strong use of data by managers in public libraries in decisions making process. At the same time, library managers lacked more extensive knowledge of math, statistics, data visualization and logic. On the positive side, they were aware about the elements of data life cycle and recognized important characteristics of data literacy. The results also showed recognition of data literacy related competencies necessary for successful public library management. Not a single public library employed a data librarian, but they defined clearly what activities such a person should do if employed. The public libraries used data mostly for library management and for user-oriented analyses and studies. When acquiring basic or additional knowledge about data literacy public library heads preferred short courses and webinars but they also liked for future librarians to acquire such knowledge during their university studies. Finally, they perceived data literacy important for development of public libraries in future.
References
- Koltay, T. (2017). Data literacy for researchers and data librarians. Journal of Librarianship and Information Science, 49(1), 3–14.
- Nayek, J. K. R., & Sen, D. (2015). Data literacy and library: An overview. College libraries, 30(1/2), 38–51.
- Bowler, L., Acker, A., & Chi, Y. (2019). Perspectives on youth data literacy at the public library: Teen services staff speak out. The Journal of Research on Libraries and Young Adults, 10(2), 1–21.
- Shafiq, M., Bhatti, R., & Naeem, S. B. (2020). Digital resources integration & data literacy perspectives among LIS professionals of university libraries in Pakistan. Library Philosophy and Practice, 4455. Retrieved December 1, 2022 from https://digitalcommons.unl.edu/libphilprac/4455
- Enis, M. (2020). Civic data partnerships: By working with local experts on civic open data projects, libraries can become the heart of the smart city. Library Journal, 145(1), 26.
Radovan Vrana
University of Zagreb, Croatia
English 
French