Tiltai

The paper presents the discourse of the social work professionalization from the viewpoints of practice, research, academic activity, and professional identity, by revealing the expression of social worker competencies in the changing society. By means of evaluating the 20-year-experience of social worker training in Lithuania, the authors reveal the identity of social work at two levels: professional (academisation and practice) and legal (profession and study status). For the purpose, a novel approach to the formation of the social work theory, study methods, and the education of intercultural communication and lifelong learning is employed.

This article addresses intersections of migration and economic development as one of the most topical contemporary challenges inthe Baltic states. It uses empirical approach to compare governmental responses to recent economic crisis starting in 2008. Articleanalyses, how these responses were reflected in statistics revealing socio economic dynamics within years of crisis and beyond.Methods of comparing statistical and analysing secondary data are applied. All three states have similar future challenges of agingand declining population and see return migration as one of possible solutions to address this challenge. However, the processesin Estonia provide a better ground for its government to claim that the country makes effort to ensure more stable development.Also, the results demonstrate that Estonia displays more different trends, while Lithuania and Latvia are closer to each other in outmigrationtrends.

This article presents the analysis of the results of qualitative research about large families’ social, economical situation and possibilities of support in the community. There were 14 respondents of large family members. All families of respondents consist of both parents and three or more children. Respondents answered to open questions. This paper presents research participants’ opinion about the economic situation of large families, family members’ economic migration problems and opportunities of community support for these families. It was found that large family experience finances’ limits and it causes the migration. The activity in community enlarge and it enable support for large families.

The study has been conducted within the ERASMUS+ KA2 partnership project “Improving the initial education of adult immigrants”. Research is based on the anonymous survey in which took part 1127 legal adult immigrants from outside the European Union. The study was performed in 2017 in the six European Union countries: Lithuania, Latvia, Romania, Bulgaria, Italy and Belgium. The purpose of this article is to investigate how information about the host country before immigration is related to immigrants’ basic sociodemographic characteristics, i.e.: age, gender and education. Statistical data analysis showed a statistically significant difference between the information, which immigrants knew before their arrival in the host country, and education as well as age groups. However, there were no statistically significant differences found between the information, which immigrants knew before their arrival in the host country, and immigrants’ gender. Moreover, information that immigrants lack most prior to their arrival is related with health care and the employment system as well as the ability to learn the hosting country’s official language.

Between the 16th and the 18th centuries, the area known from 1920 to 1939 as the Klaipėda region (Memel territory) experienced a variety of migration flows, which have been described by researchers on several occasions. When considering issues of migration, among other data, scholars from different fields often interpret personal and place names found in historical records. Based on the historical onomastics of the Klaipėda region, this article deals with the oikonyms and personal names derived from etymons bearing the meaning ‘new settler’. It examines their distribution, evolution, etymology, and motives behind picking these onymons. The author draws on research methods of historical onomastics, along with an analysis of historical sources and genealogical information. In addition to suggesting mutual links between onyms (personal names and oikonyms) of Baltic origin, the author puts forward hypotheses about the directions of population migration in the northern area of what was then the Memel eldership (Hauptamt Memel). The paper aims to offer linguistic insights into possible migration trends in the Klaipėda region in the 16th to the 18th centuries, which could later be verified by historical research.