UNI 11535:2014 and UNI 11536:2014 standards: professional profiles of librarian and archivist

Abstract

The paper presents the two national standards on the professional profiles of librarian and archivist published in July 2014 by UNI (Ente Italiano di Normazione) under the responsibility of the UNI – Documentation and information technical committee.
- Paola Manoni presents the structure and schedule of the UNI – Documentation and information technical committee, along with its main initiatives.
- Giovanna Merola outlines how – since 2000 – UNI has carried out a series of standards on non-regulated professions. UNI’s purpose is to define – on the basis of the European directives and of the European Qualification Framework – the general structure of the standards in order to ensure transparency and consistency. The technical committee UNI – Documentation and information, with its Working Group 7 – Evaluation of professions related to the management of data and documents, has so far produced two standards on the professional profiles of librarian and archivist.
- Flavia Cancedda describes the UNI 11535:2014 standard, defining the activity of librarian in compliance with the provisions of the law 4/2013 on not organized professions. Both the law and the UNI standard give a new and substantial chance to librarians, providing them with the opportunity to adequately enhance their know-how and to gather the different professional associations under a unique professional standard, now legally recognized. The paper outlines the Italian and European rules, as well as the context in which the UNI standard was developed, and illustrates its benefits and future applications in the labor market. Finally, a few significant steps of the standard are analyzed more in detail.
- Giovanni Michetti shows how the EQF model has been applied to develop the UNI 11536:2014 standard, aimed at identifying the essential competences, skills and knowledge of the archivist’s profession. He provides an overview of the standard UNI 11536:2014, that may serve different needs – from updating and re-designing professional training and curricula, to raising awareness about the archivist’s role in the information and documentation processes.