Archives Found

Spring is in the air, and perhaps you’re thinking about becoming a certified archivist? I’ve noticed a lot of folks land on this blog with search terms related to the ACA exam, and so I thought that I would share some of my thoughts and study strategies. The application deadline for the 2009 test is soon (May 15th), so hopefully this will help someone out there.

[Note: there was an upload error with the original post. Everything following this is my reconstruction of that post.]

Studying with a group

Because I knew early in the year that I planned to sit for the exam in August, I had a lot of time to map out a study strategy. I created a list of planned readings and emailed a lot of my also-recently-graduated friends (and friends-of-friends), set up a Google group, and prepared for lots of discussion. Unfortunately, after an initial flurry of activity, the group died off, and out of the initial study group of 7, I’m the only person that took the exam in 2008. The group setup did not work for me, but it has worked for others in the past. Notably, a group in 2007 (the CA Wannabes) used a wiki and weekly chat sessions to plow through the materials– you can read about their methods in the fall 2007 ACA News (pdf here). [Hat tip to Amy Hooker and Russell James for the links.] There’s also a group of archivists in St. Louis who posted some materials to the Washington University libraries website. Also– not a group, but Jason Fowler has posted his brief annotated bibliography of modern archival literature over on NeoArch.

What to study

The ACA divides the exam areas into “domains” of archival interest. Based upon the study guide suggestions and the subject areas, I would say that the best preparation for the exam would be a mixture of hands-on processing experience with various record types/media, and weighted more heavily, an understanding of archival and preservation topics from the readings. Questions vary from those on Schellenberg and appraisal methods to storage and preservation practices for acetate film and lantern slides.

I decided to follow the ACA book guide, as well as read/re-read pertinent articles from the American Archivist, Provenance, and Archivaria.

Readings 

The Handbook for Archival Certification (pdf here) has a list of suggested readings that is divided into topic areas, and the full list with citations can be found in the Handbook, starting on page 34.

This is a (shorter) list of the readings that I focused upon during the study period.

Classics:

Selected Writings of Sir Hilary Jenkinson, ed. Robert Ellis

Modern Archives: Principles and Techniques, Schellenberg
General:
Developing and Maintaining Practical Archives: A How-to-do-it Manual, Gregory Hunter
Managing Electronic Records, William Saffady
Understanding Archives and Manuscripts, James O’Toole
Domain 1: Selection, Appraisal & Acquisition
Selecting and Appraising Archives and Manuscripts, Frank Boles
Selecting and Appraising Archives and Manuscripts, Gerald Ham
Domain 2: Arrangement and Description
Describing Archives: A Content Standard
Arranging and Describing Archives and Manuscripts, Kathleen Roe
Domain 3: Reference Services and Access
Providing Reference Services for Archives and Manuscripts, Mary JoPugh
Domain 4: Preservation and Protection
Building an Emergency Plan: A Guide for Museums and Other Cultural Institutions, Dorge and Jones
Photographs: Archival Care and Management, Ritzenthaler & Vogt-O’Connor
Domain 5: Outreach, Advocacy and Promotion
Advocating Archives: An Introduction to Public Relations for Archivists, Elsie Finch Freeman
Creating a Winning Online Exhibition: A Guide for Libraries, Archives and Museums, Martin Kalfatovic
Domain 6: Managing Archival Programs
Managing Archival and Manuscript Repositories, Michael Kurtz
Domain 7: Professional, Ethical, and Legal Responsibilities
Ethics and the Archival Profession: Introduction and Case Studies, ed.Karen Benedict

To this list, I added several others:

The Law of Libraries and Archives, Bryan M. Carson

Managing Electronic Records, ed. McLeod and Hare

Preservation and Conservation for Libraries and Archives, Balloffet and Hille

Articles from the American Archivist

I looked at articles from 1998-2006 with the knowledge that I’d read all of the articles from 2006-2008 recently enough to recall the content.  Articles from the American Archivist are available through the SAA website.

Here’s a list of the articles that I sent to the group (and that I read before the exam):

-From Spring 1998, articles of interest might be:
Providing Subject Access to Images (Collins)
Preservation Re-Recording of Audio Recordings in Archives: Problems,
Priorities, Technologies, and Recommendations (Paton)
Special Collections Repositories at Association of Research Libraries Institutions: A Study of Current Practices in Preservation Management (Walters)
-From Fall 1998:
Developing a Strategy for Managing Electronic Records: The Findings of the Indiana University Electronic Records Project (Bantin)
-From Spring 1999:
Life with Grant: Administering Manuscripts Cataloging Grant Projects (Hamburger)
The Indiana University Electronic Records Project Revisited (Bantin)
-Spring 2000:
We Are What We Collect, We Collect What We Are: Archives and the Construction of Identity (Kaplan)
Appraising Public Television Programs: Toward an Interpretive and Comparative Evaluation Model (Connors)
-Spring 2001:
Voices From Vietnam: Building a Collection from a Controversial War (Stevens)
A Perspective on Indexing Slaves’ Names (Paterson)
-Fall 2001:

Principles, Methods and Instruments for the Creation,
Preservation and Use of Archival Records in the Digital
Environment (Maria Guercio)

Understanding “Authenticity” in Records and
Information Management: Analyzing Practitioner Constructs (Eun Park)
The Burlington Agenda: Research Issues in Intellectual
Access to Electronically Published Historical Documents
Elizabeth H. Dow, with David R. Chesnutt, William E. Underwood,
Helen R. Tibbo, Mary-Jo Kline, and Charlene N. Bickford
Doing the Best We Can?: The Use of Collection Development Policies
and Cooperative Collecting Activities at Manuscript Repositories (Cynthia Sauer)
Experiments in Deaccessioning: Archives and Online Auctions (Michael Doylen)
The Archivist as Educator: Integrating Critical Thinking Skills into Historical Research Methods Instruction
(Marcus C. Robyns)
-Spring 2002:

Seeing Archives: Postmodernism and the Changing Intellectual Place of Archives (Tom Nesmith)
The Power of Meaning: The Archival Mission in the Postmodern Age (Mark A. Greene)
“Though this be madness, yet there is method in ‘t”: Assessing the Value of Faculty Papers and Defining a Collecting Policy (Tom Hyry, Diane Kaplan, and Christine Weideman)
Preservation Strategies for Electronic Records: Where We Are Now- Obliquity and Squint? (Michèle V. Cloonan and Shelby Sanett)
-Fall 2002:
A Comparison of Jenkinson and Schellenberg on Appraisal (Reto Tschan)
-Spring 2003: Depending on how much user-related information we want to
wade through for this exam, we may want to discuss whether we want to
read this entire issue or not. http://www.archivists.org/periodicals/aa_v66/index.asp#66-1
-Spring 2004:
Avoiding the Golden Fleece: Licensing Agreements for Archives (Nancy E. Loe)
Jenkinson’s Writings on Some Enduring Archival Themes (Terrence M. Eastwood)
Trusting Archivists: The Role of Archival Ethics Codes in Establishing Public Faith (Glenn Dingwall)
-Fall 2004:
Back to the Future: Ernst Posner’s Archives in the Ancient World (James M. O’Toole)
Privacy Rights and the Rights of Political Victims: Implications of the German Experience (Elena S. Danielson)
In Secret Kept, In Silence Sealed: Privacy in the Papers of Authors and Celebrities (Sara S. Hodson)
-Spring 2005:
Lester J. Cappon and the Relationship of History, Archives, and Scholarship in the Golden Age of Archival Theory
(Richard J. Cox)
Chatting Up the Archivist: Social Capital and the Archival Researcher (Catherine A. Johnson and Wendy M. Duff)
-Fall 2005:
More Product, Less Process: Revamping Traditional Archival Processing (Mark A. Greene and Dennis Meissner)
Picking Our Text: Archival Description, Authenticity, and the Archivist as Editor (Heather MacNeil)
Ernst Posner’s Archives and the Public Interest (Angelika Menne-Haritz)
-Spring 2006:
“The old version flickers more”: Digital Preservation from the User’s Perspective (Margaret L. Hedstrom, Christopher A. Lee, Judith S. Olson, and Clifford A. Lampe)

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