Libraries/Digitisation/Cultural Education. Horizon 2018

The introduction and increased use of digital media are bringing about transformation processes in all areas of society. The increasing possibilities for communication and mobility are not only opening up new forms of cultural perception and design for everyday, private use, but also for public cultural institutions. So far, there are hardly any representative findings on the topic of "digital change" - even less so in the interaction with cultural education. This also applies to public libraries, which are among the educational and cultural institutions that have dealt with digitalisation at an early stage. This gives them a significant wealth of experience from which other cultural and educational institutions can also benefit. For the development of cultural education in Germany, it is therefore a crucial question how public libraries shape the digital transformation and what significance cultural education plays in this.
Against this background, the Rat für Kulturelle Bildung, in cooperation with the German Library Association (dbv), conducted a nationwide and representative survey on the shaping of the digital transformation among full-time public libraries.
In addition to taking stock, the findings of the study highlight central areas of development for libraries with regard to cultural education in the course of digitalisation. The survey focused on the following questions:
- How are libraries, as a place of cultural education, shaping the digital transformation?
- What (digital) cultural education services are available in the libraries?
- How does digitalisation affect the services, cultural education, users, the space situation and cooperation?
- How do libraries assess the financial leeway available to them in the context of digitalisation?
The survey was addressed to all library directors of the approximately 1900 full-time public libraries in Germany. A total of 668 libraries took part in the survey (35 percent response rate). The survey was conducted as a standardised online survey.