I was happy to spend 4 months as a Baltic Intern at the Yale University Library. My internship was part of the Slavic and East European Collection’s Library Fellows Program. My one semester internship at Yale became possible thanks to a scholarship generously funded by Yale alumnus Dr. Kristaps J. Keggi. I would like to also express my gratitude to the Curator of the Slavic and East European Collection, Tatjana Lorkovic, who has created and maintained the Program for Visiting Fellows from various East European countries with the help of her assistants for several years, and to the Yale University Library for its support to the Baltic Library program. I was the first Fellow to be selected from the National Library of Estonia, where I work as a Senior Acquisitions Librarian. My internship at Yale was very important to me because I learned about many different aspects of librarianship and I acquired much practical knowledge in various areas of libraries’ everyday work. My work in Estonia is in the field of acquisitions, therefore I tried to concentrate mostly on problems of collection development and acquisitions issues . During the internship, the majority of my time was spent in the Slavic Reading Room of the Sterling Memorial Library and I had a wonderful opportunity to participate in this department’s daily acquisitions work. However, my internship also included many interesting visits to various departments and libraries within the Yale University Library system, as well as great visits to the New York Public Library, Harvard University Libraries and the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C.

My Work in the Slavic Reading Room and the Cataloging Department

I greatly value the opportunity I had to take part in the Slavic Readings Room’s everyday acquisitions work – selecting, ordering and receiving books. It was a very interesting experience for me to learn about the process of transliteration from the Cyrillic to the Latin alphabet and to learn more about Slavic and East European books and languages. I also spent quite much time working with Estonian books – receiving new ones and doing selections from vendors’ and exchange partners’ offer lists. It was nice to discover that Yale’s Estonian collection is quite big and very comprehensive. I obtained a wonderful overview of the Estonian collection, which has a long history behind it. I also picked up many ideas about how to improve exchange relations between the National Library of Estonia and Yale University Library in the future, for example, what kind of publications Yale is most interested in.

The opportunity to spend 3 weeks in the cataloging department gave me a closer look in the everyday work of catalogers. I had very interesting talks with Patricia Thurston (Team Leader of the Slavic and East European Cataloging Team) about cataloging co-operation projects between various American libraries, and how effective and well organized these projects are. I like the idea of how these libraries share their cataloging resources, web links and databases. I’m very impressed by the extremely good and useful websites with their different tools and links to the resources that catalogers and acquisitions librarians need for their daily work. It’s something we don’t yet have at my library in Estonia and now I have obtained many good ideas about creating and maintaining these kinds of websites. Another new and very interesting part of my experience in the Cataloging Department was learning about the Library of Congress call numbers system and subject headings. It is quite different from the system we use in Estonia. I work very much on a daily basis with records imported from different databases of U.S. libraries and now I have a better understanding of the classification used in these records and I can more easily adjust LC headings to the Estonian ones.

My visits to different libraries and collections of the Yale University Library

During my stay here I had great possibilities to visit many beautiful and interesting libraries and collections. I’m really impressed by Yale’s many different and rich area collections from all over the world. For me, the meetings with different subject and area specialists were the most important part of my visits. I got much valuable information about their selection criteria, what resources they use to make the best selections and how to deal with different vendors’ approval plans. Because the National Library of Estonia is not using any approval plans so far, I was very interested in finding out what are the positive and negative sides of using them and how much these reduce the workload of the library. I also tried to find out as much as possible about how to provision funds between different vendors and how to initiate approval plans, describing to the vendor exactly your needs. This is a complicated process, because you must also determine how much money to spend on a wide variety of different subjects, such as history, literature and so on. I also highly appreciate the work done by the curators and their teams in creating such wonderful web pages with much useful information about the different areas and the cultures of the many nationalities of these regions. I will recommend to my colleagues when I’m back in Estonia to look at these websites and use them in their work. Last but not least – I met so many friendly people whom I can turn to in the future if I have any questions or problems in my work.

My visits to other libraries

My internship included visits to three other big libraries in America – the New York Public Library, the Harvard University Libraries and the Library of Congress. As all these libraries have had long-term exchange relations with the National Library of Estonia, I greatly valued the possibility I had to visit them and to meet face to face with some of the people whom I have had correspondence with for many years. We had very useful conversations about how to continue our exchange and how to make it work more efficiently. As there are not so many book dealers in Estonia yet who could sell Estonian books abroad systematically and with reasonable prices, I think exchanges are an important way to guarantee that the best Estonian books will be added to the biggest American libraries. And needless to say, I greatly admired the rich and well organized collections and beautifully renovated and well-kept buildings of these libraries.

Lectures about reference services

Another valuable experience I received from Yale is connected with my work as Reference Librarian, a duty that I undertake once a week at the main reference desk at the National Library of Estonia. At Yale I attended a series of very interesting lectures about reference services organized by the SQI (the Service Quality Improvement) group. I came away from these lectures with many good ideas for improving our reference services. For example, I very much liked the idea of the on-line reference service AskLive! which seems much more efficient and user-friendly than the e-mailing reference service our library presently uses. I observed that Yale has implemented its AskLive! Service very well and that it is very popular among users.

Cultural life.

A very important part of my internship was the diverse and high-quality cultural life at Yale, which I greatly enjoyed. I attended many interesting lectures by famous scholars, listened to several great musical performances in Yale’s various beautiful concert halls. My favorite places to go to during the weekends were the Yale University Art Gallery and the Yale Center for British Art with their valuable collections. When I visited New York I also took occasion to tour the wonderful Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Museum of Modern Art.

Conclusion.

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

Tuesday, August 31

Arrived in New Haven, met by William Larsh (Acquisitions Assistant at the Slavic Reading Room) who helped me to find my accommodation at 111 Linden Street.

Week 1 - September 1-3

Wednesday, September 1
First day at the Sterling Memorial Library. Meeting with the other members of Slavic Reading Room team : Tatjana Lorkovic (Curator), Pauline Spitz and Gaukhar Surtayeva.
William Larsh accompanied me to various University offices to settle the necessary official paperwork concerning my stay at Yale – to get the Yale ID, to apply for social security number and to open my bank account.
Small tour to different reading rooms and stacks in Sterling Memorial Library by William Larsh.
First basic introduction to ORBIS database’s Voyager Cataloging and Acquisitions modules by Gaukhar Surtaeva.
Thursday, September 2
Searching for books from an exhange partner’s offer list under the guidance of Pauline.
Accompanied William Larsh to different departments of the library, e.g. to shipping & receiving and acquisitions, to get a short overview of library’s daily work.
Friday, September 3
Dr. Keggi’s visit to Slavic Reading Room. Conversation with Dr. Keggi, Diana Timlin (Director, Library Development) and Tatjana Lorkovic about Slavic and East European Collection's Baltic Librarian Fellows Program.
Searching for Bulgarian book titles offered by Kubon&Sagner.
Saturday, September 4
First free day to get more acquainted with New Haven. Attended guided tour on Yale campus.
Sunday, September 5
Visited the Yale Peabody Museum in New Haven

Week 2 - September 6-10

Monday, September 6
Public holiday – Labor Day. Walked around the East Rock area.
Tuesday, September 7
Learning about Library of Congress-style transliteration from Cyrillic into Latin alphabet.
Receiving new books from Estonia and Russia (creating bibliographic records, holdings and items, creating purchase orders).
Visited Tax Department of Yale’s Human Resources to fill necessary papers.
Wednesday, September 8
Receiving Russian books arrived by exchange.
Attended welcoming dinner for Yale World Fellows Program’s new 2004 fellows at Betts House.
Thursday-Friday, September 9-10
Receiving Russian books. Coffee breaks at Yale Law School’s beautiful dining hall and garden.
Saturday, September 11
Visited the Yale University Art Gallery.
Sunday, September 12
Attended the Judaic studies conference “ Moses Maimonides: His Life and His Love of God” at Sterling Memorial Library.

Week 3 - September 13-17

Monday, September 13
Applied for permanent social security number.
Receiving books from Russian book vendor Kozmenko.
Tuesday, September 14
Receiving books from Kozmenko.
Lunch at Yale Hall of Graduate Studies Dining Hall.
Wednesday, September 15
Receiving books from Kozmenko.
Small tour to Cross-Campus Library and to the stacks, to get small overview of the Estonian Collection of the Yale University Library.
Thursday, September 16
Visited the Art and Architecture Library. Discussing collection development problems and different aspects of Arts Library’s work with Christine de Vallet (Assistant Director). Hannah Bennett (Public Services Librarian) introduced me to their web page and gave small tour in the library’s extraordinary building. Susan Brady (Project Archivist) talked about her work with different archiving projects.
Reception at Lewis Walpole Library at Farmington.
Friday, September 17
Receiving books from Kozmenko.
Had lunch with Tatjana Lorkovic and Ann Okerson (Associate University Librarian) at the Union League Café.
Attended hot roundtable “ Beslan in Context: Terror in Russia” at YCIAS , Luce Hall.
Meeting with Russell Shaddox from Library Development and Communications who interviewed me and Tatjana Lorkovic for an article about Baltic Librarian Fellows Program to be published in Yale Bulletin & Calendar.
Saturday, September 18
Visited Yale University Art Gallery and went to Yale Medical School Film Society to see the film “Fahrenheit 9/11” by Michael Moore.

Week 4 - September 20-24

Monday, September 20
Receiving books from Kozmenko.
Tuesday, September 21
Working in Art and Architecture Library and selecting art books from the duplicates they were kindly offering to give to the National Library of Estonia.
Receiving books from Kozmenko.
Wednesday, September 22
Receiving books from Kozmenko.
Visited Medical Library. Charles J. Greenberg (Head of Reference Services) showed me the collections (including the wonderful Historical Collection of the library) and introduced the work in various library units. Attended the class EndNote Basics (learning about basic features of this bibliographic database management program).
Joining Tatjana Lorkovic to go to the Yale Bookstore for the b ook signing by Robert D. Greenberg, who discussed and signed copies of his new book "Language and Identity in the Balkans: Serbo-Croatian and Its Disintegration".
Thursday, September 23
Receiving books from Kozmenko.
Staff Tea, meeting with the University Librarian Alice Prochaska.
Visited the Fortunoff Video Archive for Holocaust Testimonies, the impressive collection of videotaped testimonies by survivors of the Holocaust all over the world. Talking with Joanne Rudof, the collection’s librarian and watching one of the tapes in the reading room of Manuscripts and Archives Department.
Friday, September 24
Working in Slavic Reading Room - receiving books from Kozmenko.
Saturday, September 25
Visited the Yale Center for British Art, attending the introductory guided tour.
Listening to the Philharmonia Orchestra at Yale at Woolsey Hall together with William Larsh from Slavic Reading Room.
Sunday, September 26
Went to Joseph Slifka Center for Jewish Life at Yale to see Tony Kushner’s famous film “Angels in America”.

Week 5 - September 27 - October 1

Monday, September 27
Receiving books from Kozmenko.
Tuesday, September 28
Visited the Department of Manuscripts and Archives. Tour through different working areas and reading room led by director of the department Richard Szary. Learned about huge collections of personal and family papers and organizational records held by the department.
Presentation of the “Annual Report” by the University Librarian Alice Prochaska.
Attended a ward-winning playwright Tony Kushner’s lecture “Jewish in America” at Battell Chapel. 
Wednesday, September 29
Receiving books from Kozmenko.
Attended the lecture "Visual Cultures and Unorthodox Ecologies: The Work of Marietta Pallis (1882-1963)" presented by David Matless (University of Nottingham) at the Center for British Art. 
Thursday, September 30
Took part in Library New Staff Orientation. Getting overview of Yale University Library’s work at general. Very interesting historic tour of the Sterling Memorial Library’s building led by Daniel Lovins (Hebraica Catalog Librarian & Team Leader).
Friday, October 1
Receiving books from Kozmenko.
Searching ORBIS for Estonian books based upon a list from the vendor TEEK. Making recommendations about which books should be bought.
Saturday, October 2
Visited the exhibition ” 'The Poetry of Truth': Alfred William Hunt and the Art of Landscape" at the Yale Center for British Art.
Nice dinner with Dr. Kristaps Keggi.

Week 6 - October 4-8

Monday, October 4
Receiving books from Kozmenko.
Had lunch with Dr. Kristaps Keggi and Tatjana Lorkovic at Mory’s.
Tuesday, October 5
Receiving books from Kozmenko.
Visited the Beinecke Rare Book & Manuscript Library. Had a brief tour of the Library’s open spaces and office areas. Met the staff and got a closer look at their work. Had a discussion about different aspects of work with rare books, manuscripts and personal archives.
Wednesday, October 6
Receiving books from Kozmenko.
William Larsh introduced me to the EastView online database, which contains many resources from Russia and Eastern Europe.
Attended the lecture "Gardens with Quaint Old World Arrangements: Popular Tourism at Hampton Court Palace Park and Gardens in the 19th Century" given by Todd Longstaffe-Gowan, landscape historian and architect.
Took part in the talk "American Power and Global Security" at Luce Hall.
Thursday, October 7
Created and received on a purchase order books to be ordered from Suomen Kirjallisuuden Seura in Finland.
Concert of the music of Arvo Pärt as part of the concert series “ New Music New Haven” at Sprague Memorial Hall.
Friday, October 8
Receiving books from Estonian vendor TEEK.
Tour to the Social Science Library, the Mudd Library and the Government Documents Information Center.
Saturday, October 9
Visited the Ukrainian Heritage Center in New Haven.

Week 7 - October 11-15

Monday-Tuesday, October 11-12
Receiving books from Kozmenko.
Wednesday, October 13
Attended the talk about Factiva, the full-text product of Dow Jones and Reuters presented by Judy Carnes, School of Management Librarian.
Took part in course “E-mail Etiquette” at the Staff Center for Multimedia Learning.
Attended the lecture "William Morris: Workshop and Words" (William Morris Exhibition Opening Lecture by Alan Crawford, scholar in the history of British architecture and decorative arts) at the Yale Center for British Art.
Thursday, October 14
Receiving books from Kozmenko.
Friday, October 15
Lunch with Soraya Magalhaes-Willson (Social Sciences Librarian/Catalog Librarian, Selector/Liaison for Education, Social Sciences, and Sports). Discussed different aspects of acquisitions and cataloging of official documents and publications of different international organizations.
Tea break with Tatjana Lorkovic at the fancy Elizabethian Club.
Saturday, October 16
Attended the architecture tour of the Yale Center for British Art.

Week 8 - October 18-22

Monday, October 18
Joined Patricia Thurston’s Slavic and East European Cataloging Team for next three weeks. Patricia introduced me to the members of different cataloging teams. Brief introduction to the Retrospective Conversion (ReCon) project of old artbooks in Russian and othe Cyrillic languages by Patricia Thurston.
Tuesday, October 19
Starting working with ReCon project – searching ORBIS, to find which books already have bibliographic records and which not.
Attended the course “Understanding SFX”. The Yale University Library uses SFX to provide links from research databases to other library resources including: ORBIS, full text articles in electronic journals, electronic books, Ask! a Librarian, and ILLiad.
Working Meeting on electronic aggregators databases – comparison of aggregators and online journal subscriptions.
Wednesday, October 20
Met Dale Askey, who discussed his responsibilities and work practices as subject specialist for Germanic Language and Literature and Germanic.
Attended the Cataloging Department’s meeting about new procedures for handling the nonprint media in different departments of the library.
Lecture at the Yale Center for British Art - "How William Morris Shaped Today's Graphic Design" by Greer Allen, former University printer and senior critic, School of Art.  
Thursday, October 21
Working with ReCon project – downloading records from Library of Congress Database (LCDB) and OCLC.
Friday, October 22
Searching and downloading records from OCLC database.
Sunday, October 24
Dinner at Patricia Thurston’s house.

Week 9 - October 25-29

Monday, October 25
Learning to search in RLIN database, import records and adjust them to ORBIS.
Tuesday, October 26
Learning to create full bibliographic records in Voyager Cataloging, under Patricia’s supervision.
Wednesday, October 27
Getting familiar with the working tools used by catalogers. Learning how to use Cataloger’s Desktop. Creating full bib records.
Lunch with Patricia Thurston and Sandra Peterson (Director of Social Science Libraries and Information Services). Sandra Peterson gave me very useful information how to deal with different U.S. Government Printing Office documents, National Library of Estonia is depositary library for.
Attended Holger Hoock’s (Selwyn College, University of Cambridge) lecture "Regicide and Turtles at Somerset House: The Royal Academy of Arts and the Politics of British Culture" at Yale Center for British Art.
Thursday, October 28
Cataloging for the ReCon project. Learning about different kind of call numbers used at Yale Libraries throughout the times.
Lecture about an online reference books database "xrefer and the Future of Online Reference Publishing" by Jeffrey Laplante (Vice President, xrefer).
Friday, October 29
Cataloging ReCon project.
Saturday-Sunday, October 30-31
Trip to New York City. Watched the big Halloween parade in Greenwich Village.

Week 10 - November 1-5

Monday, November 1
Cataloging the ReCon project. Learning about transliteration from Ukrainian.
Tuesday, November 2
Finishing the ReCon project in cataloging. Talking with Patricia about different co-operative cataloging projects in the United States.
Dinner at Patricia’s neighbours house – watching the results of the US presidential elections.
Wednesday, November 3
Importing records from OCLC and RLIN for the new books received from different Slavic and East European countries and adjusting them to ORBIS.
Visited the Acquisitions Department. Talked with Marcia Romanansky (Chief Acquisitions Librarian), Rebecca Hamilton (Team Leader for Monograph and Order Support Team), about workflows in the department.
Thursday, November 4
Last day in the Cataloging Department. Learning about the complicated system of Library of Congress call numbers and doing subject analysis. Adjusting the imported records’ call numbers to ORBIS system.
Friday, November 5
Visited the New York Public Library. Mr. Janis A. Kreslins (Baltic Languages Specialist) gave me a general tour of the Library. Met with Elizabeth Diefendorf (Frederick Phineas & Sandra Priest Rose Chief Librarian) from General Research Division and Liavon Yurevich from Processing-Acquisitions Division and discussion about long-term exchange relations between NY Public Library and National Library of Estonia and how to improve them.
Saturday-Sunday, November 6-7
Trip to Rhode Island. Visited Providence and Newport

Week 11 - November 8-12

Monday, November 8
Back in the Slavic Reading Room. Selecting books from the Estonian vendor Teek’s offer list.
Listened to the piano concert of the Estonian young pianist Hando Nahkur at Jonathan Edwards College.
Tuesday, November 9
Selecting books from the exchange offer list, sent by the National Library of Estonia. Searching for materials sought by Janis Kreslins from the New York Public Library regarding book illustrations in Estonia during the years 1918-1940, to help him prepare an exhibition next year.
Wednesday, November 10
Selecting books from the exchange offer list, sent by the National Library of Estonia
Attended the lecture "Heart and Flesh: The Designs of William Morris" by Caroline Arscott (Courtauld Institute of Art, London, England) at Yale Center for British Art.  
Thursday, November 11
At Acquisitions Department and selected books from their list of duplicates, these will be sent to the National Library of Estonia. I was kindly assisted by Rebecca Hamilton.
Friday, November 12
At Acquisitions Department, selecting books for the National Library of Estonia.
Took part in the New Staff Welcome Reception and staff introductions at Sheffield-Sterling-Strathcona Hall.
Saturday, November 13
First snow. Went to see the Yale vs. Princeton football game.
Sunday, November 14
Visiting relatives in Andover, Connecticut.

Week 12 - November 15-19

Monday, November 15
Receiving Russian and Bulgarian books sent by exchange.
Tuesday, November 16
Receiving Romanian books sent by exchange.
Wednesday, November 17
Receiving Latvian books sent by exchange.
Attended the lecture "The Book Beautiful: Reading, Vision and the Homosexual Imagination in the 1890s" by Michael Hatt, head of research, Yale Center for British Art.
Thursday, November 18
Receiving books from different vendors.
Took part in the very interesting SQIC Reference Group/ SCOPA forum on "The Reference Encounter in Person and Online". The forum presentation was given by Marie Radford (Associate Professor, School of Communication, Information and Library Studies, Rutgers University).  
Friday, November 19
Receiving books from different vendors.

Week 13 - November 22-26

Monday, November 22
Visit to Harvard University Libraries - Widener Library and Houghton Library.
Meeting and introduction to colleagues in the Slavic Division. Discussion with Bradley Schaffner (Head of Slavic Division) and with others about acquisitions, collection development and work practices. Lunch in the fancy Harvard Club. Tours in Widener library and Houghton library (primary repository for Harvard's rare books and manuscripts) and introduction to the collections and libraries’ activities.
Walking around Cambridge.
Tuesday, November 23
Visited the Harvard Law School Library. Leena Siegelbaum (Bibliographer for Eastern European Law) introduced me to the library’s collection development policy and gave the tour around stacks and reading rooms. Met with Margaret Cianfarini (serials librarian) and talking about different aspects of the exchange of serials between Harvard Law School Library and National Library of Estonia.
Walking around Boston.
Wednesday, November 24
Back in Yale, at Slavic Reading Room. Receiving a gift of old books from the National Library of the Czech Republic.
Thursday-Friday, November 25-26
Thanksgiving holiday.
Saturday, November 27
Visited of the Yale Center for British Art’s exhibition “"'The Beauty of Life': William Morris and the Art of Design".

Week 14 - November 29 - December 3

Monday, November 29
Visited the Judaica Collection. Nanette Stahl (Curator) talked about the history of the collection and her work.
Tuesday, November 30
Receiving books from the Finnish vendor “Suomen Kirjallisuuden Seura”.
Wednesday, December 1
Toured the Latin American Collection. Cesar Rodriguez (Curator) gave me an overview of the collection’s history and everyday work procedures. Talked about the possibility to send some duplicate books to the National Library of Estonia in the future.
Thursday, December 2
Selecting books from the new Yale University Press catalogue, to be sent to the National Library of Estonia within the framework of our exchange program.
Helped William Larsh to find good Internet resources about Estonia, to be linked to the Slavic and East European Collections’ website.
Visited Babylonian Collection. William Hallo (Curator Emeritus) spoke about the history of the Collection and showed me its wonderful holdings of cuneiform inscriptions and also the big collection of books related to the subject.
After work, I attended the Slavic Department’s Christmas Party at Yale Visitor’s Center.
Friday, December 3
Receiving books from a Russian exchange partner.
Went to Yale Travel Services to pick up my train tickets to Washington, DC.
Saturday, December 4
Visited the Yale University Art Gallery.
Sunday, December 5
Took the train to Washington, D.C.

Week 15 - December 6-10

Monday-Tuesday, December 6-7
Toured the Library of Congress.
Monday, December 6
Met Regina Frackowiak, the Reference Librarian from the European Reading Room of LC who showed me around in Jefferson (she focused her tour on the stacks and reading rooms for area collections), Madison and Adams buildings. She also introduced me to the on-line reference service Ask a Librarian and web resources of the different area collections. Discussed various collection development problems.
Walking around in the Georgetown area.
Tuesday, December 7
Met Nina Zanegina, Senior Acquisitions Specialist in Central & Eastern European Acquisitions Section. Talked about long-time exchange relations between Library of Congress and National Library of Estonia and resolving certain problems. I obtained a good overview about her unit’s everyday work.
Visited the Geography and Map Division, saw many old detailed maps of various Estonian towns.
Lunch with Kersti Blumenthal (Estonian/Finnish Cataloger, Estonian Recommending Officer) and Nina Zanegina. Talked about different Estonian publications and Internet resources which could help her to select new Estonian books for their collection. Had a tour of the cataloging areas which gave me some idea of how these function in the largest library of the World.
Took an evening train back to New Haven.
Wednesday, December 8
Receiving books sent by the Tartu University Library.
Library’s Annual Holiday Party at Beinecke Library.
Thursday, December 9
Visited the Mathematics Library and Kline Science Library, together with our guest Mihhail Levner from Moscow and William Larsh. Talked to David Stern (Director, Science Libraries and Information Services) about the libraries’ profiles, collections, working routine and collection development policies. Got valuable information about their practices of reducing the amount of paper journals and replacing them with the electronic ones, using different user statistics.
Coffee break with Jeffry Larson, Librarian for Romance Languages & Literatures, Linguistics, and Classics. He discussed his responsibilities and work practices as subject specialist for publications from and about Romance languages area.
"Old Christmas Music Concert" by The Yale Glee Club at Battell Chapel. Got some feeling of the oncoming Christmas holidays.
Friday, December 10
Short meeting with Terry Fleischer, Acquisitions Assistant/Exchange. Talked about her work ordering Yale University Press titles for many different exchange partners in the world.
Receiving books from the Estonian vendor Teek.
Saturday, December 11
Had lunch with Dr. Kristaps Keggi.
Sunday, December 12
Trip to NYC. Visited the Metropolitan Museum of Art and walked around Upper West Side area.

Week 16 - December 13-17

Monday, December 13
Receiving books from Teek. Learning about the new rules for receiving books with accompanying CD-ROM’s and CD’s.
Tuesday, December 14
Searching ORBIS for Estonian books offered in the vendor TEEK’s new list. Made recommendations about what books should be bought.
Selected books from the new Yale University Press catalogue, to be sent to the National Library of Estonia on exchange.
Beginning to work on report of my visit to Yale.
Wednesday, December 15
Writing the report.
Visited the Near East Collection. Curator Simon Samoeil introduced me to the Collection’s history and interest area as well as work procedures of his team. Got many helpful hints on transliteration and cataloging the publications in Arabic, and also links to some good web resources.
Took part in the meeting of Yale’s SQIC (Service Quality Improvement Committee) Reference Group "Evaluating the Content of Ask!live Transcripts at Yale".
Thursday, December 16
Visiting Yale Law School’s beautiful library. Tour in the library led by Blair Kauffman, Librarian and Professor of Law. Meeting with Jo-Anne Giammattei (Manager of Acquisitions Services) and talking about their experiences and problems working in the library system Millennium in everyday acquisitions work. (National Library of Estonia uses the same system). Joining their annual holiday luncheon.
Trip to Library Shelving Facility (LSF). Detailed and very interesting tour guided by Danuta Nitecki
Associate University Librarian. LSF was designed to shelve infrequently used library materials economically and to extend significantly the useful life of such materials for the Yale University Library (YUL) System and its readers while at the same time improving the browsability of collections on campus.
Friday, December 17
Writing the report.
Saturday, December 18
Trip to New York City. Visited the Museum of Modern Art and and went to see the musical “Pacific Overtures” at Broadway.

Week 17 - December 20-22

Monday, December 20
Working on my report.
Visited African Collection.
Farewell lunch with Slavic and East European Cataloging Team at Mory’s.
Tuesday, December 21
Finishing up my report.
Christmas lunch with the staff of the Slavic Reading Room.
Wednesday, December 22
Last day in New Haven. I leave at 5:55 on Finnair to Helsinki, and then will catch a later flight from there to Tallinn.