Axiell presents award to the Digital Cultural Institution of 2011

UK and Scandinavian cultural services and technology expert, Axiell, regularly presents an award to recognise the Digital Cultural Institution of the Year. This year the award was presented at its prestigious two-day symposium ‘Rethinking Libraries?’, held in London for senior managers from archives, museums and libraries across Scandinavia and the UK. The 2011 theme for the award was "going digital to increase value for end users".

Axiell CEO, Jerk Sintorn, says, "We chose this theme to encourage cultural institutions as they make their transition into the digital world, so that they can better reach their communities, partner with local government, business and other organisations, as well as to become more responsive to local needs and to develop new services for the benefit of end users."

Axiell customers and businesses could nominate archives, libraries and museums for the award and three were shortlisted:  

• Silkeborg Libraries, Denmark for opening up their libraries for the community in evenings and weekends  
• Stockholm City Libraries for their websolution biblioteket.se, Sweden  
• Jönköping School Library Service, Sweden for the way it built a digital platform for its schools  

The winner, Jönköping School Library Service, Sweden, was chosen for its tremendous success in enabling students, teachers and parents to work digitally 24/7 through its use of Axiell Arena’s 24/7 library web portal to develop an online digital knowledge bank and to support learning in innovative ways. In the proposal it was mentioned that the school library service in Jönköping has been a front runner and the first school system to develop its services in such an innovative way.

Elisabeth Fridsäll-Emilsson, development manager, Jönköping School Library Service, says, "At the School Library Service we have worked for several years on improving our services to the school libraries by offering them digital sources. With Axiell Arena we have found the solution which allows us to increase our services to teachers and pupils."  

The desire to integrate several databases and portals into one system encouraged Jönköping School Library Service to use Axiell’s Arena 24/7 library web portal to create a new web-based platform for the school libraries that gives users one entry point to search for information, materials and resources from various digital sources as well as their school library. The platform is designed to serve as an educational tool serving teachers and students as well as other school staff and parents.