This document is addressed to social workers, librarians, municipal and civil servants, and other stakeholders in charge of policies and / or establishment of favourable conditions and appropriate care for the protection of the mental capacity and health of the aging population in their regions.
The aim of the case study is to show a good practice from Bulgaria for the social inclusion in the community cultural and educational life of the aging population from a small town and the surrounding villages in a rural region.
The objective of the Community Centre is to ensure an equal and easy access to diverse set of services and initiatives in support for the social inclusion of aging population.
Providing various traditional and electronic services, utilising information technologies and cultural heritage, the centre’s focus is on the participatory approach with the aim to create a bridge for communication and transfer of experience and traditions between generations.
The community centres in Bulgaria, the so called “Chitalishta”, are the first and oldest organized structures of the civil society in the country.
Unanimously accepted as important centres of local communities, they provide a traditional and indispensable support of the national culture.
Years ago, the Community Centre (CC) “Paisij Hilendarski 1870” choses its specific mission as a guardian and propagator of the Bulgarian culture. Nowadays, it combines traditional, established, and popular activities and new modern strategies for sustainable development.
The goals of the Community Centerс (Chitalishte) are to meet the needs of local citizens by creating, preserving, and disseminating spiritual values, to open conditions for communication between communities, and to support the preservation of folklore, traditions, and customs in the town of Balchik and surrounding areas. It preserves and develops the traditional activities such as an amateur art, folk calendar holidays, librarian activity and others – with new, innovative forms and initiatives.
The partners of the Community Centers are local and regional institutions active in the area of culture, education, social and health care, and others with interest to policy amendments and / or organization of well-being of people no matter of their gender, age, religion, origin, or race.
More particular, the partners of the Community Center “Paisij Hilendarski 1870” are the local municipality, city art gallery, schools, regional and national clubs and unions of writers, artists, poets, filmmakers, choirs and ballet masters, business support organizations, and others.
The direct target groups of the good practice are citizens of the Municipality of Balchik. This Chitalishte is an attractive center for the aging population, and the retired people over 65. For them special sections are organized in the community center for the support of social inclusion and mental health via access to knowledge and creation of new skills as well as through participation in various types of cultural and learning events.
To achieve sustainable results, center’s approach is to turn the organization into an attractive place for the widest pool of users, giving equal access for all people regardless of gender, religion or age, a place where people can read books freely, communicate with different artists and to be engaged in creative initiatives.
The community center provides affordable infrastructure with access to ITC applications and internet along with various forms for social inclusion via creative and educational activities for aging population in the area such as a
choral singing, theater groups, literature clubs and arts. These are a small part of the Chitalishte’s approaches to maintaining the spirit and health of the aging population in the municipality.
The library activity is used as a form through which the Chitalishte realizes its task of expanding and enriching the knowledge and interest in science, art, and culture of the interested stakholders.
The library at Paisii Hilendarski 1870 Community Center, including the Digital library and the Electronic catalog – offers the users traditional and electronic services, combining information technology and culture in modern library services and works to establish the library as an important center in the cultural and educational life of the community.
Information and internet center at the library of the Chitalishte offers consultation and training for access to electronic resources, information about vacancies, independent search for information, opportunities for writing a resume and cover letter, copying services, printing, presentations, recording information on a disc or external memory from a videotape, from a gramophone record and others.
Concert hall with a large stage area and a capacity of 400 seats is used to hold various cultural events, concerts, holidays, competitions, festivals, theater productions and more.
The participatory approach is in the center’s various form for the adults’ involvement during their free time in the activities of the Literary Club, the Artists Club, the Choir, Theatrical groups, Popular songs groups, Vocal studios, Municipal choir of retirees, etc.
Creating a bridge between generations, to keep the traditions and culture heritage, is another approach to reach the goals of the center.
The key success factors could be found in the 150-year history of the National Chitalishte “Paisii Hilendarski-1870” – Balchik. Over a century, the center has won its position to support civil society and has won the trust of the people. The Chitalishte relies on its roots and is a social, cultural, educational, and informational organization. It actively participates in the life of local communities and helps to strengthen and develop local cultures, social and economic partnerships.
The 150 years of the community centre’s existence demonstrates that the good practice addresses people’s needs properly and has been validated with the stakeholders and final users.
The impact of this good practice on the people’s livelihoods is very positive. Their livelihoods have been financially, and/or economically improved (and become more resilient) as many of the users have the opportunity through involvement in the community center’s clubs of interest (i.e. literature, art, music, etc.) to acquaint knowledge and practical skills on a variety of issues, to gain experience through participation in many areas of the fine arts: graphics, painting, sculpture, woodcarving, etc.
Their involvement in theatrical productions, musical choral performances, exhibitions, presentations, and others gives them further incentives
The good practice contributed to an innovation in the livelihoods of the aging population. It provides relevant conditions (institutional, economic, social, and environmental) that need to be in place for the good practice to be successfully replicated.
By building a digital library with a digital catalog of a rich collection of books, directories, and periodicals from various fields of knowledge, the community center allows users in times of crisis (such as the COVID-19 pandemic) to continue to educate remotely.
The establishment of an Information and Internet Center at the Chitalishte‘s Library helps for online and video presentations during literary readings, celebrations of holidays and anniversaries, maintaining contacts with other clubs and community centers in the country. It helps as well for communication with the Bulgarian communities abroad in order to raise and preserve their national self-consciousness and self-confidence.
There are many constraints and challenges encountered by aging population, especially in the remote and rural areas. These challenges could be addressed considering the following key points:
The lessons learned are related to the need to:
To be institutionally, socially, economically, and environmentally sustainable, the community center needs to:
The sustainability is also inweave in the benefits of this practice, mostly in protection elderly’s health, mentality, and independent way of living.
There are great possibilities of extending this good practice widely by local communities. The practice in Bulgaria has proven that it works both at a single/local and at a national level. Connected local community centres in a bigger national network help them to stand up jointly for policy amendments in favour of the community centres in the whole country and for obtaining government support.
Organizations of aging population in other geographic areas could review their local conditions, which should be respected, and available resources ( i.e. human, natural, infrastructure, etc.)in case they decide to adapt this good practice to the their local context.
The impact and usefulness of the good practice are great and replicable.
Community center: philendarski1870 (at) gmail.com
CC Library: ph1870 (at) abv.bg
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