CEE/Newsletter/Newsroom/1lib1ref în Romanian - The Next Level
- By: Claudia Serbanuta and Elena Damian
The campaign that invites librarians to add references to Wikipedia articles had a relatively long history within the Wikimedians of Romania and Moldova User Group (WMROMD) activities. Over the time we tried various formats of events and partnerships: from open meetings to sessions with international guests, from lectures in rural libraries to workshops at the National Library of Romania. After the success of 2023 participation in the CEE #1lib1ref Campaign, where contributions on Romanian language Wikipedia positioned us third in the region and forth in the world, librarians involved in the 1lib1ref campaign decided to take this event to a new level. For 2024 the librarians, with support from WMROMD, planned to engage more, not only as campaign contributors, but also as event organizers.
Through the Wikimedia Foundation annual grant, WMROMD planned the budget for the campaign as two types of investments: prizes for the campaign and also support for events for and with librarians, related to the campaign (covering transport fees, coffee breaks and vouchers). At the open call for 1lib1ref events in libraries from Romania and Moldova, eight events were submitted and this made it possible for this year's campaign to bring together 148 librarians - the largest number of participants on this campaign. Besides the online contributors to the campaign, five librarians who participated in previous WMROMD courses or campaigns applied to organize events in this year's 1lib1ref campaign.
We had three types of events organized: an online workshop with librarians, events in one’s own local library, events in another library. These diverse approaches allowed us to not only raise awareness about the campaign but also start conversations about next community events and approaches.
Following community conversations about sources used in documenting Wikipedia articles, the online workshop organized during the campaign focused on good practices in identifying various qualities of sources. School and university librarians joined this conversation online and for many this was their first interaction with Wikipedia as a good learning space for them and their students. The workshop opened up a conversation about engaging with library associations for next campaigns.
The format of workshops organized in-house, by librarians was the one expected the most as it might seem easy to organize. However, even in this case, the librarians engaged more than expected. They not only created a local event but reached out to librarians from public libraries in their area. This meant that larger libraries invited librarians from smaller, often rural libraries, to join in for a 3-4 hour long workshop (in Chișinău - MD, Giurgiu and Brașov- RO) but also that a city library (like Bârlad Municipal Library) invited librarians from a larger library, Vaslui County Library to learn about and edit Wikipedia.
The surprise for WMROMD was the proposal of two librarians to organize events in other libraries than their own. Camelia Iuliana Pârvu who is a rural librarian that had the most contributions in last year's campaign, proposed an event in the largest public library in her region, in Ploiești. Similarly, Elena Damian, a top contributor in the campaign last year, and the newest member of the WMROMD, proposed an event in Craiova, in a large county library in a different region than her own library. These events were hard to organize and required time and commitment to succeed.
As Elena states, this way of participating in the campaign was a great adventure and learning experience that created new possibilities of collaboration:
‘ I should mention that I am a librarian and as such I am committed to bringing closer librarians and Wikipedia, as these two coordinates are strongly related. When I went to Craiova, which is a big town, with a great public library, it was a first time experience as I got to travel in a different city, in a different environment. I felt encouraged to talk about my personal experience on Wikipedia and make librarians feel comfortable on starting their own wiki-trajectory. There were more than 25 librarians who participated and some of them made their first steps on editing. One important result of this experience is that it made possible a project that was on our mind for a long time: I will be the first Wikimedian in Residence in Romania at Dolj County Library in Craiova. Participants at 1lib1ref in Craiova wanted more time to talk about their library special collections and cultural history, and wanted to learn how to connect their collections to Wikimedia projects so I am excited to continue with the Wikimedian in Residence experience.’
The 1lib1ref workshops hosted by librarians who edit Wikipedia became real professional exchanges events that not only focused on the current campaign but looked into future opportunities and ways of contributing. Not every librarian that participated became a wikipedian, however, an important part of the community of librarians editing Wikipedia became more bold in planning for their next contribution to the community. In 2024, 148 librarians from Romania and Moldova attended #1lib1ref events and 56 of them participated in the campaign with 905 contributions on 444 different pages.
Just like libraries, the 1lib1ref campaign is multifaceted and can offer great connecting and learning opportunities. As long as libraries and knowledge continue to be open.