VMU Library participates in the Erasmus + project for citizen science research in the Baltic States

In order to develop research on open and citizen science in Lithuania, Vytautas Magnus University Library participates in the Erasmus+ project “University Libraries Strengthening the Academic-Society Connection through citizen science in the Baltic States (LibOCS)”.

The project has started in early 2022 and will run until mid-2024. The initiator of the project is the University of Tartu. The participants of the project are also Tallinn University of Technology (TalTech), the University of Latvia, business partners from Germany (Immer Besser GmbH) and Greece (Web2Learn) and Kaunas University of Technology.

Citizens’ science is one of the activities of the open science movement, where research projects are initiated or carried out with the help of amateur researchers (citizens).

The primary goal of the project is to raise public awareness and involvement in citizen activities in the Baltic countries (Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania), to integrate citizen and open science activities in Baltic universities, and to increase knowledge exchange and cooperation between university librarians.

The most important tasks of this project are: 1) to study what encourages and hinders the involvement of citizens in open science activities and to share insights about the activities of academic libraries in citizen science; 2) to initiate and maintain a dialogue between researchers and librarians of higher education institutions in the Baltic countries; 3) to organize trainings aimed at improving the skills of citizen and open science of the academic and library staff of higher education institutions of the Baltic States; 4) develop open access tools for librarians to be available as open educational resources (OER).

More information about the project: VMU  Research Management System