Dr. Astrida Wallat - Head of Library in the train station, Veitshöchheim

Professional background & career.

After I had to give up my dream of becoming an opera singer (for a lack of talent), I quickly realized that I would switch to the "literary subject". So I studied literary studies in Würzburg, then worked in several publishers, including as an editor-in-chief at Reclam-Verlag in Stuttgart. Alone, at some point, the longing for my homeland was overwhelming - due to the lack of publishing there, I came more by chance to lead the Veitshöchheim library in the train station. Where the district closed, so to a certain extent, you have everything here: a fantastic backdrop, many books that, fortunately, you no longer have to deal yourself, creativity, exciting encounters with people, technical challenges. And if it has to be, a little drama.
Today I often say to myself: "Why didn't you do that with the library?" Yes, why?

Learn more about the library at the train station here.
Photo credits Article Dr. Astrida Wallat: © Dr. Astrida Wallat

Personal experiences.

If things go well, libraries are located where everyone can be, what and how they want to be (of course reasonable behavior provided). Every interest, activity or question finds its place. Conversely, this means that as an employee, from very small to senior age, you have to do with many different people, for which you have to/may develop various offers and concepts.
The book babies sometimes come to us in the morning, after which an introduction to primary school takes place, the internet café for seniors and the Italian conversation group meets in the afternoon. All of this in a single day. Such a variety must create a different professional environment first ...

Meaning & added value.

I personally believe that libraries have an exposed importance in view of the diverse, barely countable political-social crises and threats. As institutions, they have a long tradition and thus the touch of the old confidante, and at the same time a rapid development has taken place from classic loan operation to modern information, communication and participation locations in recent years. Consuming -free meeting points, where not least single people or new citizens can come together and network, will certainly become increasingly important in the future.
The library in the train station has now even unfolded something like brand potential. Our library of things is called "Güterbahnhof", the library introductions for children call themselves "Lokin!", We lend umbrellas with our logo, and the well-running social media channels repeatedly record the topic of "train station" in mini formats, for which we get a lot of positive feedback. With the local high school, we even produced our own picture book via our toy locomotive Veit in the reading garden, which the growth of reading is now given for the first time a library visit.
When the children ask about the loan with shining eyes about Veit, the real moments of happiness give me.

Recommendations.

If you get involved in the public library professional field, you have an extremely versatile, promising and safe job in which you can open and get involved as a personality.
It is important to be an interest in people in general, openness, the ability to redesign things again and again, tolerance towards those who think differently and - not to hide - a certain talent for organization and administration.
As a line, I tried to set up my team in such a way that various skills come together that complement and support each other. Nobody can be able to do anything, but in a small library like ours everyone has to do a lot.
And: A library can only be as good as the team that she wears.

Developments & future prospects.

Technical will surely play an increasingly important role: Makerspaces, robotics, offers for dealing with the Internet and apps, especially for older people. Of course, the question is also exciting to what extent AI is in public libraries and what function you will face there.
It will be important to create room concepts that enable encounters, participation and creativity. Great future topics are still the promotion of democratic thinking of childhood, training a consciousness for tolerance and sustainability. To all of this, age -specific concepts must be developed and implemented.
Not to be neglected (it is quite important to me to emphasize this) with all the new is the promotion of reading. To make the book, whether analogous or digitally, to put it in a modern way again and again in a modern way, that reading not only is an indispensable basic competence, but at the same time a great adventure, I still consider a future -oriented task. My fear is sometimes that in the end everyone deals with robots, but nobody can form more sensible sentences without the help of AI.
So you can see: there is a lot to do ...

Today I often say to myself: "Why didn't you do that with the library?" Yes, why?