By: Mary Manning, University of Houston, SAA RAO Section Past Chair
While great attention has been placed on best practices
(although somewhat nascent) established for accessioning, processing, and
preserving electronic materials, it seems that comparatively very little
attention is given to how we provide access to these materials. Solutions for
access to born digital materials lag behind. Yet these resources are preserved
and processed precisely so they can be used by researchers, just like their
analog counterparts.
What are our colleagues doing to provide access to born
digital materials? What are the largest barriers to providing access? Are best
practices for born-digital access taking shape yet? If so, what are these best
practices? Is there a roadmap that archivists can follow to guide them to their
desired destination of providing access to these valuable resources?
There are two groups that I know of who are working hard to
answer these questions. The first is a research study while the second is an
RAO working group.
A research study being conducted by the research team of Rachel
Appel (Bryn Mawr College), Alison Clemens (Yale University), Wendy Hagenmaier (
Georgia Institute of Technology), and Jessica Meyerson (University of Texas at
Austin) comprise the first group. These archivists note that archivists “lack
empirical data that might empower those working with born-digital materials to
map the landscape of born-digital access efforts and to work together to design
future access solutions.” They hope to begin to help fill that gap by
documenting existing trends, challenges, and forward strides in providing
access to born-digital materials—in terms of both policy and practice.
Through a mixed-methods study (a survey conducted in fall
2014 and semi-structured interviews conducted in spring 2015), they aim to
gather data and uncover insights about what types of institutions and
professionals are working to provide access—and where, when, and how. They hope
to highlight not just what those institutions and professionals have
accomplished already or what they're tackling right now. Their study also “endeavors
to capture the landscape they envision for access in the future.”
Anonymized data from the study will be made available to the
profession, along with analysis of current trends and possibilities for further
research. During a session at the 2015 SAA Annual Meeting, the research team
will share a brief analysis of the findings and facilitate a hands-on hackfest
to begin designing achievable best practice models for access. SESSION 110, Born-digital
Access Hackfest: Collaborative Solution-Building for Current Challenges, is
scheduled for 8/20/2015, 11:00:00 AM to 12:00:00 PM, and the research team
hopes to see you there. I know I will be there.
The second group working to answer the questions is the Access
to Electronic Records Working Group, which is co-chaired by Rachael Dreyer and
Amy Schindler. Greg Kocken is the leader of the initial research subgroup,
Alexis Adkins and Jarrett Drake are the leaders of the bibliography subgroup,
and Stacey Lavender is the leader of the survey subgroup. The RAO Steering
Committee approved the formation of the working group in June 2014, with the
charge to investigate and share current best practices for providing access to
electronic records.
The initial research subgroup went to work immediately as
the work of the other bibliography and survey groups depends heavily on the
initial research group’s findings. Members investigated current best practices,
current strategies/technologies, and challenges. The subgroup’s work included
surveying the professional literature from 2002 to 2014 from the U.S., Great
Britain, and Australia to identify current technologies in use to provide access
to electronic records.
The bibliography subgroup is working on an annotated
bibliography and has been considering where and how to present the bibliography
online, access points, the audience, scope, and other questions. The subgroup
has already found that with the limited resources addressing access
specifically, their work will dig into related works and broader topics to
compile the parts related to access.
As the research study group noted, to date, we, as a
profession “lack empirical data to empower those working with born-digital materials
to map the landscape of born-digital access efforts and to work together to
design future access solutions.” However, this research study group and the RAO
working group are making great strides mapping out that landscape, by gathering,
analyzing, and making available information to the rest of us looking for solutions
for providing access to born digital materials.
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