On 20th and 21st of September 2022, the ADELE partnership travelled to Dublin, Ireland for the second in-person meeting, which was preceded by the training session held in Brussels back in March 2022.
The project partners coming from Italy (EGInA Srl and ICCU), Belgium (PL2030) and Bulgaria (GLBF) have been wonderfully hosted by the project coordinator, LGMA. The LGMA – which stands for Local Government Management Agency – is a state agency that provides a range of professional services to local authorities. The functions of Libraries Development include the following:
- the provision of advice, assistance and services to library authorities in relation to the public library service;
- the making of such recommendations to and the provision of such services for the Minister in relation to the public library service;
- action to promote and facilitate library co-operation within Ireland and internationally.
The Libraries Development branch at LGMA supports the implementation of the 5-year strategy for all 330 public libraries across the country.
Over the two days, the ADELE project partners had the chance to closely and in-depth analyse the ADELE self-assessment tool that will help libraries to reflect on how they use digital technologies and to assess their digital readiness. At the moment, partners have structured the conceptual framework of the tool (including the areas and statements under investigation). In order to validate and finalise the tool, the ADELE partnership have created a large network of 100 libraries, coming from the project partners and all over Europe.
Such associated libraries have been involved in the validation of the ADELE beta version and in October focus groups are to be organised to further explore the results and gain suggestions/opinions on how to best adapt the ADELE self-evaluation tool to the libraries’ needs.
Furthermore, the meeting in Dublin allowed the project partners to already start reflecting and agreeing on the structure of the second project result, which will be the development of a guide for the activation of a digital transformation in public libraries. This will also be supported by the collection of 100 inspiring case studies and stories coming from the associated libraries.
The meeting was very productive and partners look forward to the next in-person meeting, which will be organised by PL2030 in Brussels, Belgium, together with the first international dissemination event.
Stay tuned to know more about ADELE!
