Continuing professional development of Public Librarians: with special reference to Ampara District of Sri Lanka

This paper presents research carried out to investigate the status of Continuous Professional Development (CPD) of public librarians of Ampara district and the factors influencing their continuous professional development that leads to professionalization. All public Libraries (n=58) in the Ampara district are considered as population and 50% of them (n=28) were selected as sample, by using the purposive sampling technique. The questionnaire was used as the research instrument. Both qualitative and quantitative data analyzing techniques have been carried out to generate reliable results. This study resulted that public librarians in this region have faced several types of hindrances in their professional development during the prevailed civil unrest for three decades in the island. Besides, some personal and institutional factors have retarded their professional development up to some extent. However, the Postwar situation has provided them a path to some extent of CPD during the last ten years. This study concluded that there is room for professional development of public librarians and necessary steps have to take to educate them, giving a good exposure with other library professionals and expertise, networking with other librarians and professional organizations. Therefore, this study recommends that relevant institutions and authorities have to collaborate and plan workshops, training, and other professional short courses to educate them and to provide the opportunity to take part in such programs, national and international conferences.