Welcome to Skåne: a holistic and health promoting integration platform including libraries

Abstract

Since August 2016 Partnership Skåne, a regional platform for integration, is extended with an ongoing pilot study where also libraries and museums are included in the reception of newcomers. The pilot study is called Welcome to Skåne and is built on the idea that libraries together with museums are important social arenas that facilitate inclusion and health. As a part of the mandatory introduction course to society for everyone with a new residence permit visits to museums and libraries have been added. Groups of newly arrived people spend half a day each at the library and at the museum guided both by communicators speaking their native language and by library and museum staff.

The pilot study Welcome to Skåne has so far led to an earlier introduction of newcomers to the library and a deeper understanding of what a public library in Sweden can offer and what role it plays in society. For the public libraries it is a big advantage to connect to a functioning structure of reception and integration and to meet so many persons from a prioritized target group and establish a relationship at an early stage.