The Yearbooks of the Estonian Librarians Association 2018
Preface
Dear reader, in your hands you are holding the 30th Yearbook of the Estonian Librarians Association. The first edition of the Yearbook was published in 1990, describing the activities of the Association in 1989. Information presented in this book provides an overview of the current state and trends of Estonian librarianship. The forerunner for this Yearbook is a publication named “Estonian Librarians Association: Re-establishment and Activities in 1988” compiled by Linda Kask, that describes ELA re-establishment story and first steps. Immediately after that, the ELA Board have decided to launch the Yearbook to increase the publishing opportunities for the authors and present the ELA Chronicle. Thanks to many authors and writers, our yearbook is reflecting a great period of activity of Estonian libraries and nowadays it is available in the digital archive Digar, in addition to its printed version.
2018 was the anniversary year of the Republic of Estonia. Estonian librarians have gifted the virtual exhibition "Librarians of the Century" for the country 100th anniversary. It presents the story of Estonian librarians, introduces and adds more value to the work of librarian by pointing out changes in activities of Estonian librarians through the most charismatic librarians. In order to promote reading, the ELA Section of Rural Libraries has asked libraries to give 100 reading hours as a gift to Estonia 100th birthday. As a result, in February a total of 160 reading hours took place in libraries and kindergartens, schools, youth and elderly day centers all over Estonia, as well as, at the Estonian School in New York and the Estonian Society of Luxembourg. Various photos from these events can be found on the Internet.
It is known that ELA was established at the 1st Congress of Librarians and in 2018 it was possible to celebrate the 95th anniversary again at the Congress. The 11th Congress of Estonian Librarians “The Library is Freedom” took place on 18th and 19th of October in Rakvere. The aim of the Congress is to bring together the Estonian Librarians Community once in five years to improve cooperation between different types of libraries. Presentations were focused on the future, introducing new services in libraries. In addition to the Estonian experience, presentations were also about the new generation of libraries in the Nordic countries. The Congress also summarized the strategy paper "The 21st Century Library”, based on an evaluation of the quality of the public library service, which was voluntarily conducted by 125 public libraries all over Estonia at the beginning of 2018. This Yearbook contains a large part of the reports presented at the Congress.
The Board of the ELA has prepared the third development plan for the Association, which defines its activities and development trends for 2019–2024 years and approved it at the 2019 general meeting. Traditionally, the summaries of the activities of the ELA and other professional associations have also been included in the cover of the Yearbook.
We extend our sincere thanks to all the authors!
Editorial Board
Summaries
100-year-old Estonian European Cultural Heritage in 2018
Marju Kõivupuu, Tallinn University Senior Research Fellow
The goal of 2018 both in Europe and Estonia is to raise people's awareness of cultural heritage and its value, mediate timeless values, ethics and aesthetics through cultural heritage, create different ways of preserving and interpreting cultural heritage and to support the sustainability of the living heritage at the present time. Cultural heritage is not only binding us through a common past, but is also oriented towards the future by creating history. The article deals with topics related to cultural heritage, trying to answer questions whether cultural heritage is just something that was always a part of people's everyday life and what today is studied by professionals and practiced as a hobby. Or maybe cultural heritage is more like everyday fun activities, such as gathering together at the community center to enjoy aspic, blood sausages or potato salad; compulsory sprout sandwich on the family dinner table, giving flowers to teacher on the first and last school days; making a snowman with the first snow, watching Estonian Song Contest, Presidential Reception or New Year’s Eve TV shows and reading its accompanying critical reviews in social media and the press (as the virtual community is not a community), popular quotes from literature, films and song lyrics etc.?
Local history and reasearch in Uhtna
Inge Pikkoja, Uhtna Library Director
The library is the best place of the countryside for collecting and preserving hometown history. Librarian becomes the most intelligent and historically aware person in the area, taking the place of a school teacher. The librarian is trusted, materials that are given to him are preserved and are available to everyone. Researching local history brings the diversity to library work, highlighting the importance of the library for the community.
The article describes the beginning and the following steps of the local history research, as well as, the way it is being captured in Uhtna Library in Lääne-Viru County. Initially it was a home coterie and later it has developed into electronic environment - topotheque that is being upgraded and managed by the community. In other words, it is a collaborative platform that provides access to digitized historical sources of the community. Inge Pikkoja, the Manager of the first Estonian topotheque and Uhtna Library Director, has called topotheque a village museum, that everyone can visit from home. She has gained a lot of knowledge while researching local history and her curiosity has developed interest in other people, as well as the motivation to participate in the research.
Time to move out of the comfort zone? Results of the survey of visitors and non-visitors of Estonian libraries
Mai Põldaas, Tartu City Library Development Manager, Research Expert
Time to move out of the comfort zone? Results of the survey of visitors and non-visitors of Estonian libraries
The main purpose of the research was to analyse two areas of Estonian culture – museums and libraries, the reasons for visiting or not visiting them. During the research, the task was to identify services that visitors and/or potential visitors would like to use. In addition, research was planned to reveal services that museums and libraries do not offer yet and to identify new possible target groups, who would use these services in case of their availability. Research results will help to find new possibilities to make museums and libraries more popular and attractive for potential visitors and new target groups, as well as increase their economic profit.
In Estonia, this research was conducted for the first time. It is unique, since it examines two cultural heritage areas at the same time – museums and libraries, visitors, non-visitors and the usage of services, while applying integrated methodology. Research consists of interviews of Estonian residents and companies via phone: survey respondents are Estonian residents, who are at least 15 years old and differ according to geography, gender, age, education and language. The sample is 2000 respondents that includes visitors and non-visitors of museums and libraries. For companies, four fields of activities were chosen: manufacturing industry, education, health care and social welfare, also art, entertainment and leisure. Companies were selected randomly among those, who had 0-49 employees. The sample is 200 and it includes companies that used services of museums or were in cooperation with museums and/or libraries, as well as those who had no contact with these institutions.
In this article only the results of the research among library visitors and non-visitors will be briefly introduced. The main conclusions are:
within the last 12 months, the share of library visitors among the entire population aged 15 and over is 50%. Among library visitors, there are significantly more women, people who speak Estonian, students, highly educated people and housewives with 1-2 children. Among library non-visitors, more than half of the respondents are men, Russian-speaking residents, people aged 45 and over, people with secondary education, housewives with no children and retired people.
the main reason for visiting a library is for the pleasure of reading and the possibility to choose publications that respond to the reader’s needs. A quarter of visitors pointed out different reasons related to studies, hobbies or work. Two most mentioned reasons for non-visiting library were lack of time and possibility to purchase books or other publications.
the strongest side of Estonian libraries, according to respondents, is a suitable and easily accessible location (70%), 62% of respondents have pointed out wide and sufficient variety of books and other publications, 61% think that the service is good/perfect. Current communication activity is a weak side of Estonian libraries: only 35% of respondents are pleased with it and a half of all respondents (49%) have not answered this question.
Possibility of visiting library is lower than visiting a museum: 22% of Estonian residents plan to increase their number of visits to the library; 32% of residents do not plan to go to the library at all during the next year.
Libraries through the eyes of local government
Andrus Haugas, Director of Leisure and Cultural Services of Pärnu City Government
After the administrative reform in Estonia in 2017, the number of municipalities have decreased to 79 and only few municipalities were not affected by the administrative reform. Today Pärnu is no longer what it used to be. A year ago, the area of Pärnu was 33 km2, but now it is 858 km2. Immediately after enlargement, there were 10 libraries acting as separate insitutions. Already during negotiations there was a proposal to make out of libraries of merging municipalities Pärnu Central Library branches. Both parties mutually agreed and these changes were applied. This agreement was easily approachable, since Pärnu Central Library have been fulfilling the role of main library in the county and cooperation with rural libraries was really good. All parties know and trust each other.
It must be admitted that the way library work should be organized in municipalities is clearly described in legislation. Although administrative changes came into force on 1 January 2018, it was obvious to everyone that accession is not finished yet. This is a process and it takes time. Also accession agreement states that no major changes will be made within 4 years. This means, among other issues, that majority of things should remain the same for population. The article summarizes the impact of administrative reform in Pärnu.
Lääne-Virumaa public libraries in the light of administrative reform or a critical look to yourself
Maiga Parksepp, Head of Haljala Local Library
The administrative reform in Estonia has not left without attention the Lääne-Viru County,
there are now 8 municipalities instead of 15, 7 municipalities and 1 city, and changes in the library structure are inevitable. Libraries are looking forward to unification, voluntary or forced. What are the reasons for the unification? How they will affect everyday work?
At the moment, when libraries are under critical look of local government in the light of new reform, there is good opportunity to give yourself a honest assessment, review your activities, outline the best and leave all the outdated and unnecessary behind. It is important that all parties could value the library as an important educational and cultural institution in the countryside, understand the responsibilities and goals, feel the joy of action and the ability to work.
Librarians emphasize the importanсe of the library in the local community.
If the number of readers is constantly decreasing, is the library still so important? Is the librarian still professional enough in his / her work? Do librarians and employers or local government agree on the necessity of the library?
There's no great loss without some gain, says the old man's wisdom. Does librarian also agree with this in the light of administrative reform? What are the fears and why they have developed? The time will show whether the fears were reasonable, although the first steps of change have been made.
Training maze
Ilmar Vaaro, Assistant of Information Studies in Institute of Social Sciences at University of Tartu
Public libraries depend on developments in society. The aim of this report is to point out how the administrative reform and other accompanying developments in public libraries will affect in the light of training. The sources are articles, research results and interviews specifically conducted for this report.
Lack of territorial integrity criteria and the use of voluntary merge model have resulted into diverse society pattern after the administrative reform of 2017 in Estonia. Veiko Sepp has distinguished at least 11 types of local government units in the new administrative territorial division. The majority of those are the municipalities of the center and parish that connect one city center with its suburb (21); municipalities characterized by countryside settlement (14); towns connected into one urban settlement (10).
Options for reorganization from the point of view of public libraries: municipalities, where nothing has changed; municipalities where new units were added, but no big changes appeared; municipalities, where have occurred branch libraries, have the library activities either changed or the library closed.
Factors affecting the broader aspect of training are related to legislation and development plans.
When awarding a profession certificate, there comes a recognition of skills and knowledge, despite of the time, place and way they were received. The competencies achieved while studying for degree level allow you to work in a wide variety of areas in life.
From the employee's point of view, we can define pre-community education, community-based training and post-knowledge upgrading. In this context, vocational training plays an increasingly important role. It is important that an unassisted community gets expert support from an experienced colleague. The training palette has not changed much lately. Does the library become multifunctional with changes in the content of the training?
Trainings in the countryside are considered to be very important. The farther and more specific the subject of the training is - the less interest occur. An important part of the training is the financial aspect. Free trainings and use of e-learning environments would definitely help. In case of the e-learning environments there is a question of content managing resources. More and more the community has to contribute to training itself.
This situation needs to be fully assessed and corresponding actions should be taken.
Estonian Librarians Association (ELA) activities in 2018
31.12.2018 762 active members, including six honorary members, belonged to the Estonian Association of Librarians. The ELA's supporting members are the Harju County Library, the Central Library of the Lääne County, the Central Library of Pärnu, the Central Library of Valga and the Viljandi City Library.
In 2018 the number of members has increased by two: 14 new members have joined the association; 12 members have left ELA during the year. Campaign “Join the ELA!” that took place during the Annual Meeting and Library Days, has brought 8 new members to the association.
The Board of the ELA had nine members and have held five meetings. One person works for the ELA office.
In 2018, there were 3 sections, 4 committees, two working groups, a Young Professionals Club and an Ex Club.
Information Day for Rural Libraries (up to 30 participants) takes place on a regular basis, as well as school libraries spring (85 participants) and autumn Information Days (80 participants). In addition, there is a summer seminar for school libraries (20 participants) and for rural libraries (45 participants).
50 librarians participated in the national day of children's library worker in autumn. A series of training sessions took place in the AT: Academic Training Course with more than 40 people attending. Librarianship brainstorming was conducted under the guidance of a new analytical center to study the applicable general data protection rules (50 people attended).
Special libraries section met twice a year on Information Days. Special libraries section and collections management committee have organized a study trips to Võru County. Nearly one hundred librarians became part of the collections management committee autumn seminar. Antiquarian books committee have met two times to get to know various historical collections. For the 13th time, the terminology committee have organized a Terminology Day.
Since 2014, the ELA has a Young Professionals Club that becomes more and more popular every year. The club meets two times a year. The winter seminar has been popular (not only among young people, but also among senior colleagues). In 2018, the summer seminar, BibliCamp, took place in Türi and the topic was about the use of social media for marketing library services.
The general meeting of the ELA members was held on 28 February in the conference hall of the National Library, where have participated 172 members (according to the listing - 265 members). The report of the ELA's activity, financial and auditing committee of 2017 was presented and the plan for 2018 was approved. Heads of structural units of the ELA talked about their activities and plans. Members were elected to the Board and the Audit Committee.
At a meeting “Libraries in Culture”, the look was taken at Estonian cultural policy, issues of public library quality assessment we discussed, as well as its strategic development. The meeting has begun with a thank-you event, where the best librarians and the best library activities of the year were recognized.
The most important event of 2018 was the 11th Congress of the Estonian Librarians, "The Library is Freedom", which took place on 18-19 of October in AQVA Conference Center in Rakvere. Librarians celebrated with the Congress both the Republic of Estonia 100th anniversary and the Estonian Association of Librarians 95th anniversary. At the same time, traditional nationwide library days "Let’s Meet in the Library" have started.
The event was organized by the ELA in cooperation with Lääne-Virumaa County Central Library. 220 librarians have participated from all over Estonia from rural, scientific, school and special libraries. A total of 26 reports were presented during two days, 19 digital posters showing successful activities and projects. Performers have shared best practices, encouraged and inspired each other to contribute to the future of Estonian libraries. Virtual exhibition “Librarians of the Century” was prepared and presented, as a gift from Estonian librarians for 100th anniversary of the country.
Based on librarians' vision document “Library of 21st Century” quality assessment model for public library services was completed in 2017. In early 2018, the first major self-assessment round took place, in which participated 125 libraries across Estonia. The "Public Libraries Quality Assessment Report 2018" was completed, and conclusions were made at the Congress.
In 2018, project competition "Libraries-Museums-Youth” was organized for the second time across all areas. 22 applications were submitted to the competition and evaluated by a five-member committee. 12 projects were fully or partially accepted. A total of 10 libraries, 7 museums, 12 youth centers and 423 young people participated. The seminar, which took place on December 5, summarized and supported the libraries, museums and youth centers that introduced their activities.
The association board drafted a development plan, which was sent to members for improvements. The new development plan for 2019-2024 was adopted at the general meeting of the association in February 2019.
Estonian Library Network Consortium in 2018
Kristina Pai, Executive Director of the Estonian Library Network Consortium
In 2018, the Estonian Library Network Consortium (ELNET) had 18 members and partners. There were no new subscribers this year, but negotiations were in progress with Tallinn Health Care College, with whom the signing of the accession agreement remained for 2019.
During the year, 7 Board and 5 General Meetings were held. Several documents (annual report, budget, work plan, ESTER security protocol, ISE statute, ELNET prize statute) were confirmed, it was decided to integrate the e-Repository portal with European portal and developments were discussed. In 2018, the new ELNET development plan was prepared and approved in the beginning of 2019.
There were eight working groups: Library System Managers' Board, Working Group on Cataloguing and Classification, Working Group on Coordinating the Digitizing Activities, Working Group on Database of Estonian articles ISE, Working Group on Estonian e-Repository, Working Group on RDA, Working Group on Licensing of E-Resources and Working Group on Open Data that started in 2018.
Payments up to 3 million euros were processed through ELNET, that were mostly spent on scientific databases, development, as well as system maintenance fees, labor costs, etc. Extracts from the e-catalog ESTER were submitted to the Authors' Fund on the basis of a contract in force since 2005. The contract also states that the rental compensation should be paid to the authors annually.
Index Scriptorum Estoniae, a database of Estonian articles, is mainly compiled from newspapers, magazines, articles and reports published in Estonia. In 2018, publications were mainly bibliographed for the purpose of compiling own theme bases. DIGAR's Estonian article portal is used as an alternative to ISE.
EMS is an all-subject thesaurus-structured keyword search for information in Estonian, such as various types of publications. The EMS was compiled in 2018 by the National Library of Estonia, the Library of the University of Tartu and the Library of the Baltic Defense College. With actual editing was dealing 9-member editorial board. In 2018, were added 464 new EMS entries (221 keywords and 243 references). At the end of the year, the EMS had 60,664 entries (39,463 normative keywords and 21,201 references).
The aim of the e-Repository portal is to bring together Estonian digital cultural and scientific heritage. You can search the portal for records, books, maps, pictures, articles, sculptures, sound and video recordings, and other digital scientific and cultural information. E-Repository provides with a single access to the databases created by Estonian memory institutions (libraries, archives, museums), universities and other research and development institutions. The e-Repository portal does not preserve digital objects; digital collections are located in repositories of memory institutions.
The ELNET Consortium coordinates joint procurement of e-Science databases. In 2018 it was granted more than 3 million Euros for joint procurement of e-Science databases. At the beginning of the year, a new procurement procedure and a 2018 procurement plan were approved at the general meeting. Several public procurements of databases were terminated and launched in the Public Procurement Register.
The Activities of the Estonian Music Library Association in 2018
Kaie Viigipuu-Kreintaal, Chairman of the Estonian Music Library Association
In 2018, the Estonian Music Library Association once again had the opportunity to organize an international event. In cooperation with Tallinn University Institute of Humanities and IASPM Norden (Nordic branch of the International Association for the Study of Popular Music) international seminar „Popular music – research and resources in the Nordic-Baltic region” was organized on 26 and 27 April in Tallinn.
The aim of the seminar was to bring together two different sides of pop music - researchers and interest groups. The seminar included 15 presentations from Estonia, Lithuania, Finland and Norway. In addition, it was possible to visit the exhibition of the Estonian Organization of Musicians related to the theme of the seminar.
The annual meeting of the EMLA and the autumn training day took place on October 5 at the Tallinn Central Library.
However, the main theme of the training day was music therapy, where music therapist Alice Pehk introduced the basic principles of music influence, gave a brief overview of music therapy and its main application areas and the use of music in self-regulation. All participants also had the opportunity to gain their own experience of music by passing a short music therapy session.
In 2018, 100 records of music literature published in Estonia were entered in the bibliographic database RILM (Literature International de Littérature Musicale), as well as their English annotations.
EMLA members participated in IAML (International Association of Music Libraries, Archives and Documentation Centres) 67th Congress in Leipzig, as well as in BAAC (Baltic Audiovisual Archival Council) annual conference in Tallinn, where two reports were presented from our side.
Ilvi Rauna has continued her work as a vice-president of IAML's Libraries in Music Teaching Institutions branch, while Kaie Viigipuu-Kreintaal is a member of IAML Copyright Committee.