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Introduction
The COVID-19 pandemic spread around the world and precipitated lockdowns and restrictions by governments to contain its further spread. The measures included closing down economies and other activities including schools and university campuses. Higher education institutions in Africa opted to change mode of teaching despite the environmental and technological infrastructural challenges. Higher education institutions took measures to continue their academic programmes, most moving to e-learning and remote teaching as per recommendation of UNESCO (2020a, 2020b).
The purpose of this article is to outline how the National University of Lesotho Library supported the National University of Lesotho (NUL), as it changed its mode of teaching from contact learning to e-learning in response to COVID-19. The library responded by supporting the e-learning mode with digital content.
Background
Lesotho is officially known as the Kingdom of Lesotho with a population of two million people. The seat of government and the capital city is Maseru. Lesotho is located in southern Africa while completely surrounded by South Africa. All its borders lead into South Africa.
Lesotho has several institutions of higher learning, but one public university, the NUL. The NUL was established in October 1975, by an Act of Parliament, although its origin dates back to 1945 when the University College was established by Roman Catholic priests with five students. It now has a total enrolment of over 10,000 students and 370 academics (NUL Strategic Plan 2015–2020). The hub of its administration and main campus is in the town of Roma. This is where the university library, the Thomas Mofolo Library, is located.
The NUL Library is central to academic work at NUL, ensuring support of core business of the university. It does this by providing unfettered access to digital collections, a well-balanced print collection and library spaces that promote learning, research and community engagement. Although the NUL Library operates as a national research point, allowing unregistered users to use its facility for research, only the following categories have lending rights, bone fide students of the university, staff member of the University as defined in the appropriate University statutes, extra-mural member approved by the Library Board and visiting research fellows and/or professors. The NUL Library comprises the Thomas Mofolo Library as the main Library at Roma Campus and the...