The project has entered its practical phase in Randers, as the first user training sessions have been effected this week.
The Randers Working Group found, through its preliminary survey of the city and the local area, that the most important aspect of our environment was a significantly lower level of education in comparison to other Danish cities of a similar size.
In consequence of this, we approached a local educational center for adults with little or no education (the VUC). We suggested a scheme of cooperation between the library and the educational system, with the purpose of furthering the possibilities of the pupils to achieve the skills that would enable them to take an active part in a democratic and rapidly changing society.
We arranged a meeting with the leader of the VUC and some interested teachers, and our proposal was very positively received. The final outcome of the meetings was a cooperation with three teachers, who integrated the visits to the library and our teaching of the many possibilities a modern library offers into the planning of their overall teaching programme for their
classes.
The first of these library sessions took place on January 19 and 26. The participants at these occations were a group of young people (19-20 years of age) who had left the traditional school system untimely because of heavy social problems of various kinds, and now are trying to catch up through this course at the VUC. They are not users of the library – some had not set foot there since preliminary school – and therefore we started the first session out gently and relaxed by telling them about the library and its services over a cup of coffee. We went on with a guided tour of the library, putting an emphasis on the materials and services we, in agreement with the teacher, expected would have their special interest, such as music, magazines, books for young people etc. If we sensed a little apprehension on their part at first, we believe that the relaxed and non-demanding approach helped to ease it up.
The second session was dedicated to introducing the library’s search system (the OPAC) to the participants. First, the system was demonstrated on a large screen by the librarians, and later the participants were working separately with exercises at their own computer. They were asked to look up books or other materials by title, author or subject and afterwards to find them on the shelves, helped and guided by the librarians.
On this occasion it showed that we have not chosen the easiest of participants to work with, since a number of them did not show up for the second session; but this we regard as a matter between them and their VUC teacher. And those who did show up appeared to be positively interested, asking questions and adding exercises of their
own.
26.01.2005 Eva, Lisbet & Claes
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