Within the framework of the Slavic and East European Collection's Baltic Librarian Fellows Program I visited the Yale University Library as an intern from the Latvian Academic Library (LAL). The one semester internship at Yale was possible due to a generous gift from Yale alumnus Dr. Kristaps Keggi, MD and the Curator of the Slavic and East European Collection, Tatjana Lorkovic, who has created and maintained the Program for Visiting Fellows from different East European countries with her assistants for many years. I had a chance to visit the New York Public Library, the Harvard University Libraries and the Library of Congress in Washington, DC as a part of the Program.

During my stay, most of the time I worked in the Slavic and East European Reading Room in the Sterling Memorial Library (SML). I spent 3 weeks in the Cataloging Department and nearly 2 weeks in Acquisitions Department. I had an opportunity to visit nearly all the departments of the SML and the many libraries of Yale University. I had a wonderful possibility to talk to the staff of many different collections and departments and to compare work in the various libraries at Yale. Although they all together form the Library system of the Yale University, there are differences in the organization of work and library collection management. Each library has done its best to serve the users as efficiently as possible. I had a very good chance to compare very different libraries from Arts and Music to Mathematics and Medicine. I was very impressed by the work done in the Arts Library and Cushing/Whitney Medicine Library. I was able to observe some of the Reference librarians' work in the Medical School Library and could learn about the services they provide to their users and the unusual practice of "personal" librarians - librarians "assigned" to specific students.

I was mainly interested in collection development, collection assessment and acquisitions issues. I met with area specialists in the subjects of history, literature and linguistics and had a chance to discuss the various ways of purchasing printed material, new and old, from different vendors and bookstores/antiquarians. The aspect of antiquarian services might be of great interest to my library. I was able to observe the different tasks that the area specialists perform and their everyday tasks. The area specialists were very helpful explaining the different aspects of their work. Libraries in Latvia conduct this kind of work quite differently, and I highly appreciated the area specialists' explanations that helped me understand their work in area collections better. I learned about liaisons between the Library and the faculty. To my mind, this kind of work is very well organized and productive.

I was introduced to American cataloging rules and authority control. Both procedures are substantially different from guidelines used in Latvia. I got to know how documents in vernacular languages are collected, cataloged and maintained. I learned about the role of the Library of Congress in the library network in the USA and the Cataloging in Publication (CIP). People who perform this work in the Library of Congress (LC) shared their knowledge with me. I was made aware of some of the problems that the LC and other American libraries are now facing. Furthermore, I was able to search the Yale University Library catalogs and found valuable information concerning Latvian dissidents during the Soviet era. My library is taking part in the project of the Center "Memorial" in Russia that is publishing a biographical dictionary of dissidents in the former U.S.S.R. I believe that some of the material I found here at Yale might be included in the project's findings on Latvian dissidents.

Librarians in Latvia are presently very interested in the role and functions of libraries as providers of informational services and different information search tools, traditional and modern, used to reveal their collections and to promote more readers to use them. I visited several collections of Area Studies in SML - the Latin American, African and Judaica Collections and could compare their different databases and web pages that have been created to help their users have better idea of their work and to have easier access to their rich collections. Some digitalized collections were shown to me in the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscripts Library. The work they have done creating numerous detailed databases of manuscripts is amazing.

I had a chance to visit several unique collections at Yale - the Babylonian Collection, the Historical Sound Recordings Collection and the History of Medicine Library. These collections are not like other, more traditionally organized, collections of libraries, and they impressed me very much. I had a rare possibility to see and even touch objects that are thousands of years old and cannot be found in museum collections in Latvia. I was very impressed to hear the history of these collections and to learn about the background of some of their unusual items and to see how devoted the people are to their work there.

I enjoyed my stay at Yale very much. I could attend different open lectures on various subjects not only in the SML but also in other lecture halls and museums. I could visit numerous museums with very rich collections, several theaters and listen to good music from classical music to blues and jazz. Thanks to the Curator, Tatjana Lorkovic, I was even able to go to the New York Metropolitan Opera to listen to world's best singers. I highly appreciate the time and knowledge the librarians at Yale shared with me, especially the staff of the Slavic and East European Collection and the Slavic and East European Cataloging Team. I am very grateful to all the friendly and kind people whom I met at Yale University, and who shared their knowledge and made me feel welcome everywhere I went. I had several opportunities to watch my Yale colleagues and their families enjoying special festive events - everybody was friendly and in good mood.

I hope my internship will promote cooperation between Yale and Latvian libraries. I will share the news of my experiences at the Yale University Library with professional librarian organizations in Latvia, telling about all the good work performed in the Library and the ways some problems were solved. I do hope that contacts between the Yale University Library and the Latvian Academic Library will be fruitful and mutually beneficial in the future.

Below is the schedule of activities in which Ms. Muizniece participated while at Yale:

1st week 3-6 Sept
3 Sept - Arrival
4 Sept - Arrive at the Sterling Memorial Library. Visit the Library Human Resources office, met Bernadette L. Cioffi. Visit Organizational Development & Learning Center, Yale University. Get acquainted with the staff of the Slavic and East European Reading Room and the mission and principles of the Collection.
5 Sept - Sterling Library orientation tour. 6 Sept - Visit Office of International Students & Scholars, Yale Univ. Get Yale ID. Visit Yale University Tax department.

2nd week 9-13 Sept
9 Sept - Yale University orientation. Meet new University staff members. Learn history of the University, its basic principles, possibilities for the staff. Tour of New Haven. Talk with Ms. T. Lorkovic, Curator of the Slavic and East European Collections, about the Sterling Memorial Library, its structure, different departments etc.
10 Sept - Learn how to search the library catalog Orbis and the Library of Congress database. Search for Russian books.
11 Sept - Visit Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, orientation tour for new students. Talk with Ms. T. Lorkovic about Latvian book publishers, compose a letter to a Latvian book shop "Globuss". Attend a meeting at SML in honour of the victims of the 11th Sept. 2001. Concert at Beinecke Library in honour of the victims of the 11th Sept. 2001.
12 Sept - Tea at Alice Prochaska. Meet the Librarian of the Sterling Memorial Library. Concert at Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscripts Library. Learn to create a preliminary bibliographic record. Search the local and LC databases for Latvian, Lithuanian, Estonian, Romanian books.

3rd week. 16-20 Sept
16 Sept - Visit of Payroll Office. Meeting with the International tax coordinator. Lunch with Dr. K. Keggi and T. Lorkovic. Coaching session Orbis 2 cataloging with Audrey Ho.
17 Sept - Mudd Library. Class: Library Orbis 2 Voyager acquisitions module.
18 Sept - Mudd Library. Practice session with Audrey Ho. Very helpful! Visit Mathematics Library and Engineering Library.
19 Sept - Checking books sent as gift by the Library of Congress.
20 Sept - Import bibliographic descriptions from the LC database. Create new bibliographic records for new books.
22 Sept - Party at Ms. T. Lorkovic's home in Guilford. Meeting with curators of other collections.

4th week. 23-27 Sept
23 Sept - Create new bibliographic records for new books received as gift of LC.
24 Sept - Check Russian book lists offered for ordering. 25 Sept - Create bibliographic descriptions of ordered books. Visit The Federal Building (Social Security number). 26-27 Sept Create bibliographic descriptions for Estonian, Latvian and Lithuanian books. My acquisitions module does not work yet.

5th week. 30 Sept - 4 Oct
30 Sept - Lunch with Ann Okerson, Assistant Librarian, Collection Development, technical services, discuss different possibilities offered by the Yale University, political and economic situation in Latvia and Eastern Europe.
1-3 Oct - Search Orbis for Romanian book titles, create preliminary bibliographic records.
4 Oct - Visit SML Manuscripts and Archives. Get acquainted with Fortunoff Video Archives for Holocaust Testimonies. Tried to watch one film, but due to some technical reason, there was no sound, so we could only read the synopsis.

6th week. 7-11 Oct
7 Oct - Training session with Rebecca Hamilton, Acquisitions Dept., Monograph Support Team.
8 Oct - Start work in Slavic and East European Cataloging. Get acquainted with the staff and introduced to the main principles of the team's work (Patricia Thurston - Team Leader). Spend 3 weeks in Cataloging. Visit a lecture on campus "Building an Ethical Globalization" held by Mary Robinson, former president of Ireland and former United Nations high commissioner on human rights.
10 Oct - Visit Latin American Collection (C. Rodriguez). Get familiar with working tools used by catalogers. Observe how to create a full bibliographic record in Orbis. P. Thurston told how the new library system Orbis was introduced and about the Library's approach to the problem and its staff's participation in it.
11 Oct - Visit Music Library (Ken Krilly). Visit the lecture "Bonampak: a spectacular view into the Mayan past" by M.D.Coe, Peabody Museum.

7th week. 14-18 Oct
Work in Cataloging Dept.
14 Oct - Visit Judaica Collection (Nanette Stahl) Visit a roundtable discussion "The new U.S. National Security Strategy document: what does it mean for international cooperation?" with panelists Charles Hill, John Ikenberry, Ernesto Zedillo, moderator Ian Shapiro.
16 Oct - Visit Susanne F. Roberts Librarian for European History, Coordinator of Humanities Collections. Talk to Manon Theourux about authority control. Learn about authority control and its principles.
17 Oct - Visit Jeffrey Larson at Research Services and Collections and learn what selectors do and how they order books from abroad. Visit Music Library, Historical Sound Recordings Collection (Richard Warren). Meet a Latvian student Arija Weddle who works there.
18 Oct - Visit Babylonian Collection !!! (Ulla)

8th week 21-25 Oct
Work in Cataloging, search Orbis for Latvian books in backlog. Search backlog, do subject analysis for Latvian books.
21 Oct - Attend 2002 Service Quality Award Ceremony.
22 Oct - Meet student Torrence Thomas and discuss possibilities how and where to find information on history of Lithuania. Visit screening of the Oscar-Nominated Inuit film "Atanarjuat/The fast runner" and its makers at Yale.

9th week 28 Oct - 1 Nov
Work in Acquisitions, Monograph Support Team for 2 weeks.
28 Oct - Get introduced to the staff and the basic principles of the team's work (Rebecca Hamilton). Learn to create Purchase Orders (Holly Darico).
29 Oct - Learn to receive books on standing orders (Rebecca Hamilton, Lynette Robinson). Visit a lecture "Illuminated manuscripts at Yale University" by J. McCrillis.
30 Oct - Learn to receive books on firm orders (Rebecca Hamilton, Lynette Robinson). Attend New Staff Reception in Beinecke Library.
31 Oct - Visit Arts and Architecture Library, meet the staff and learn about their work, books on reserve and separate special collections.

10th week 4-8 Nov
Work in Acquisitions. Import records from OCLC and RLIN to Orbis.
6 Nov - Visit African Collection (Dorothy Woodson)
7 Nov - Attend meeting of the Acquisitions Monograph Support Team. Listen how they discuss and solve their work problems.
8 Nov - Return back to Slavic and East European Reading Room!!!

11th week 11-15 Nov
Work in Slavic and East European Reading Room. Search local and LC databases, create purchase orders, preliminary bibliographic records, receive exchange books on approve.
15 Nov - Visit New York Public Library. Meet Janis Kreslins and W. Siemaszkiewicz. Get acquainted with Baltic Collection, discuss exchange of literature between NYPL and LAL.

12th week 18-22 Nov
Work in Slavic and East European Reading Room. Learn to receive serials and multi-part books.
18 Nov - Staff tea at Sterling Spoon. Possibility to meet colleagues from different departments, meet new staff members.
20 Nov - Lecture in the Yale Center for British Art "English Art and National Identity, 1918-39" by Andrew Causey, Prof. of the History of art, University of Manchester

13th week 25-27 Nov
Work in Slavic and East European Reading Room.
25 Nov - Visit History of Medicine Library (Toby A. Appel). See their book collection and collections of different medical instruments and weights. Visit Cushing/Whitney Medical Library (Charles J. Greenberg head of Reference Services). Learn about their work at the Reference desk and personal librarians for medicine students.

14th week 2-6 Dec
Work in Slavic and East European Reading Room. Receive Hungarian and Romanian books on approve from exchange partners and book vendors Kubon & Sagner.
3 Dec - Visit Beinecke Library (Ellen R. Cordes). Attend ribbon cutting ceremony at the Library Shelving Facility and have a tour of the LSF.
4 Dec - lecture by Deanna Marcum, President of the Council on Library and Information Resources. Visit Beinecke Library (Nicole Bouche )
6 Dec - went to concert at Woolsey Hall "Nutcracker Suites" of Tchaikovsky and Duke Ellington. William Larsh also went to the concert!!! Unbelievable! He told me he enjoyed it.

15th week 9-13 Dec
9-10 Dec - Visit to the Library of Congress, Washington, DC. Visited European Division and met Ronald Bachman, Area specialist, Poland. He told about the work of the European Division, showed round the Library building. Visited Cataloging and met Agate Tilmanis who told about cataloging in publication (CIP) and its problems. Visited the room where books were selected for the Library from the Copyright Dept. (Lolita Silva). Visited Acquisitions, met Nicholas Thorner, Senior acquisitions specialist and Carolyn F. Powers, Head, Central and Eastern European Section and discussed the exchange program with the Latvian Academic Library and its problems. Searched the LC catalog and looked for information on Latvian calendars and Latvian dissidents.
11 Dec - Work in Slavic and East European Reading Room. Create purchase order for Romanian books.
12-13 Dec - Visit to Harvard University. Visited Widener Library, had a tour of it. Visited the Slavic Division, talked to Sarma Liepina about the work of the Division, creation of the bibliographic records, book purchase from Latvia, exchange with other libraries. Searched the Library catalog for Latvian calendars. Visited Harvard Business School, met with Cynthia D. Churchwell who showed the Baker Library and Historical Collections and told about its peculiarities. Met with Indra A. Reinbergs, Manager, Research Staff Development, who told about case studies, and Harvard Business School Publishing, told in more detail about some case studies, e.g. of the newspaper "Diena", Latvia.

16th week 16-20 Dec
Work in Slavic and East European Reading Room.
16 Dec - Created purchase order for Lithuanian books. Had lunch at Mory's with the staff of the Slavic and East European Collection and the Slavic and East European Cataloging team.
17 Dec - Write my final report. Christmas party at the SML.
19 Dec - Visit Divinity Library.