Short bio

I have been working in adult education since 2014. It all started with the implementation of Erasmus+ programme projects at the Gabrielė Petkevičaitė-Bitė Public Library in Panevėžys County, where I work. I organize staff mobility to European non-formal adult education institutions. Since 2018, I have been working with groups of adult learners in the library in informal education – I create non-formal English language learning and reading clubs.

My story

Adult education is useful and meaningful for adult learners and the adult educator. I felt and realised this when I started working with groups of adult learners in the library. It is an activity that not only obliges giving but also brings back and enriches with a bang. In my story, I want to tell you about what volunteering can bring to adults and how the activities of these volunteers positively contribute to the institution's prestige.

Adult learners are formed personalities, so communication with them is a great advantage for the educator. People come with their own life and professional experience, with expectations and motivation; all they need is agreement on how to achieve improvement together.

In self-learning, participants learn together with the group in the library and develop independently. By engaging in leisure activities – participating in the English chat club Let'sTalk – highly motivated members of the club devote their personal time every day to improving their English spoken language, listening, and reading skills. Such a work of active lifelong learning shapes the responsibility of these learners for their own and their colleagues' learning progress, allowing them to become volunteering activists and even library ambassadors in international cooperation.

Club volunteers Jūratė Šamelienė, Jūratė Baltušnikienė, and Artūras Girdauskas independently conduct classes of the English Chat club, establish international cooperation relations with similar clubs abroad, participate in Erasmus+ program mobility during which they take over the good practices of clubs operating in European libraries. In May, volunteers Jūratė Baltušnikienė and Jūratė Šamelienė represented the library at the international conference Occupy Library in Milan, where they gave a presentation prepared together with the coordinator of adult education activities V. Švediene - myself - "Using remote communication platforms for language learning and community divination." The presentation shared the experience of the English chat club "Let's Talk" activities: it talked about the need for remote classes during quarantine and the possibilities and advantages of this format in gathering an international community of English language enthusiasts.

These success stories testify that community members, thanks to the library's informal adult education programs, not only develop and learn for themselves but also create progress and value for the community, represent the library, and disseminate its cultural services.

"Volunteering is about communion, striving to grow spiritually and intellectually with others, to share your best experiences and knowledge. It's also about new acquaintances, new horizons, and most importantly, it's a sense of meaning and depth that you're giving; you're contributing to the city's community and a better society." (Jūratė Baltušnikienė).

"I've been a member of the English chat club Let's talk for years. This is an important element of my constant learning of English and the application of knowledge. So, you want to share that knowledge with your clubmates by moderating classes, sharing articles in English, and other ways. I think the contribution of the members themselves to the activities of the club is vital because we need to change, improve, and discover something new. I take these efforts of mine as responsibility for the existence and change of the club. Our club meets with groups from abroad visiting the library under the Erasmus+ program, and we remotely discuss works of fiction with members of the book club from the state of Missouri (USA). So we're already strong and confident in speaking English." (Jūratė Šamelienė).

"As a volunteer, I feel like I am not only an enthusiast of my club, but also an ambassador of our library, our city" (Artūras Girdauskas).

For me, a sense of well-being and fullness is the realization that I am growing and developing with the adult learner community, that we are working together to look for new learning formats, expand our horizons, and keep pace with the modern community of lifelong learners.