“How to Work Better” Peter Fischli & David Weiss (1991)
ryct [by-nc-nd]
June 27th, 2011
Towards Doing a Good Job
June 20th, 2011
So You Want to Work in LAMs or How to Take My Job
You know what makes having a great husband, great house & great friends even better?
A great job.
For those of you that don’t know, I’m a museum curator and registrar. This means lot of things. For example, today I: arranged the donation of artifacts, researched & created exhibit content, loaded some photos onto our Flickr account, learned how to create a small humidity chamber to flatten old photographs, coordinated with a contact on a small photography exhibit, reviewed a policy document I helped write, started preparing a final report for a grant we got 2 years ago, edited a grant proposal for a different project, and read about the Encoded Archival Context: Corporate Bodies, Persons and Families XML schema.
I’m asked fairly often what degree I have, what classes I took and generally how I got to where I am, so I’m putting it all down in one place. Below are my 5 best pieces of advice for those interested in LAMs [libraries, archives & museums].
January 7th, 2011
Professional Goals for 2011
I’ve never been one for resolutions, but I usually take the time each new year to reflect on personal growth and goals. Last year was dedicated to growing and healing personally, as well as setting aside time to read.
Having make sufficient progress towards those goals, I’m devoting 2011 to being a year of professional growth. This public declaration is inspired by overheard discussions between @cyclinarchivist, @archivesnext & this blog post by @benuski.
1. Gain a strong foundation in museum theory, practice & trends
Although my skills and experience will definitely enable me to succeed in a museum environment, I’ve not been as immersed in the museum community as I am in the archives community. To remedy this, I’m slowly creating a list of blogs & Twitter accounts to follow, books to read, as well as scoping out professional organizations. [Any & all recommendations are very welcome!!]
2. Attend at least 1 professional conference
Going to more than one would be amazing, depending on funds/time-off/etc. Regardless, I’m starting a list of possibilities. Luckily, none of them are too far away, so travel wouldn’t be prohibitive.
- Michigan Archival Association Annual Meeting- on Beaver Island
- Midwest Archives Annual Meeting – in St. Paul
- Association of Midwest Museums 2011 Conference – in Chicago
- Museums and the Web Conference – I’m especially interested in the Linking Data, Museum Publishing & Info-Seeking sessions; in Philly
- Great Lakes THATCamp – at MSU
- Society of American Archivists Annual Conference – I’ve just joined the Museum Archives section so I’d especially like to go; in Chicago!
3. Put my knowledge of XML & metadata into practice
The museum is beginning to form an archive and that means we need to get researchers to the materials. Since we’ll mostly likely be working within our current PastPerfect environment, I want to do the best I can do take the Dublin Core metedata provided and work it into robust, useful finding aids that match standards whenever possible. Quite an undertaking for my first job, but I’m actually really excited about it. Actually, there’s something I’ve learned in every class that I’m ready to use in the Real World.
4. Finish my masters
Everything is on track for this, just 7.5 credits to go!! I’m pretty excited that not only am I first in my family to graduate college, but also the first to complete a masters. I’m also pretty excited to be done with homework.
5. Become a valuable member of the museum team
Making the leap from work-study museum assistant at the herbarium to professional museum curator is rather intimidating, but thus far has been an exciting, invigorating and a welcome challenge.
6. Learn new skills
This is pretty much a given, but I want to be intentional about learning, even after I’ve finished school. Continuing to learn Drupal, putting my coding skills to use, becoming an XML guru, becoming familiar with exhibition techniques, learning digital & physical conservation skills – the list is endless.
I’m sure I’ll add to these in the next 12 months, but it’s good to have something to work toward and making it public adds a layer of accountability.
Time to get things accomplished!!!!
November 4th, 2010
Serendipitous archival herbaria finds
I don’t think I’ve yet mentioned the newly created “Why Archives Matter” tumblr.
Its creation was thus:
[This was all Twitter exchanges]
Me – Here’s a link to cool old ads
Alexis – We should start a site for things like that to show Why Archives Matter
Me – That sounds great
Noah – You could use Tumblr!
Me – Ok! Done!
Alexis – Cool!
Check it out, there’s some cool stuff from a variety of places there.
And the best part – YOU CAN SUBMIT!
So please do! Here! Do it!
After creating the site and browsing online collections to find neat things to share, I came across this flier on the Library of Congress’ American Memory website from the 1800′s that I promptly sent to my bosses at the Herbarium.
Oyster says:
I intend to publish a catalogue containing the names of all plants of North America, which will be numbered so it will be handy to use as a check-list.
&
The catalogue I intend to publish will also embrace the names of all botanists of North America so far as can be obtained.
He asks:
Friends of science, please give the above your personal consideration.
To my delight, my boss at the herbarium followed up with this. He found a reference to Oyster that called him a “Little Known Kansas Botanist,” checked with University of Kansas & this is what we found out:
Oyster personally published his catalogue in 1885 (second ed. 1888): Catalogue of the phaenogamous and vascular cryptogamous plants of North America (exclusive of Mexico). The second edition listed 174 families, 1665 genera, and 10123 species. Most of Oyster’s library and personal collections appear to have been lost in fires in 1886 and 1893. KANU has just a handful of his specimens.
I’m incredibly sorry to hear that he lost so much work in a fire – he clearly went through a lot of time and effort to collect and document specimens, especially now that I’m cataloging specimens at the herbarium, I have a better appreciation to the thoroughness and attention to detail and time it takes to collect.
I hope you enjoyed that nerdy narrative as much as I do.
To close, here’s an herbarium poem:
TO MY HERBARIUM
Yu dry and dead remains!
Poor, wrinkied remnants of a beauteous prime!
Why, from your final doom, should I take pains
To stay the hand of time?The worid would pass you by:
For beauty, grace and fragrance all are gone.
Your age is homeliness to evesy eye,
And prized by me alone.Not beautiful, but dear,
Your wrecks recall to me the happy past.
Wandlike, your stems can summon to appear
The days that could not last.I breathe the summer air!
I wander in the woodland paths once more!
Again the copse, the dell, the meadow, wear
The loveliness of yore.Turned to the God of day,
Your little lips come, prayerfully, apart.
With the soft breeze your leaves, reviving, play
Sweet music to my heart.The friend who in those years
Shared warmly in my rambles far and wide,
Back, with the same old fondness re-appears,
And trudges at my side.These are your charms to me!
While such dear recollections ye awake,
Your ruins, blackened, crumbling though they be,
I treasure for their sake.May I, like you, dry flowers,
When in young life I can no more engage,
A dear memento be of happy hours
To those who tend my age.
October 20th, 2010
Becoming a grown up in the span of a month
In my last post I mentioned there were some exciting things going on in our lives.
Time to share!
One
We’re buying a house! This house, specifically:
They accepted our offer last week & we had the inspection Monday and, while there are things that need work, things are moving forward. Now we just need to secure financing & wait 25 more days until closing!
It’s a great 1 story house, built in 1925, with two bedrooms [one of which will be a yoga/sewing room for ME!], a huge basement [that Joel can transform into his man cave], a deck, fireplace, bigger kitchen & a bathtub [which means it meets all our requirements]. It needs some work [ripping up the gross carpet & refinishing the hardwood floors will be the first major project] but you can’t beat the price – $23,000. Plus, it’s in a quiet neighborhood & just a few blocks from downtown Ypsilanti.
Many thanks to Tammi Ebenhoeh [our great friend Alisha's mom!] for all her work!! She’s been an incredible help in this process & we definitely recommend her if you’re shopping for a home.
Two
Both Joel & I had job interviews yesterday at 1pm for our dream jobs!
My interview was at the Arab American National Museum in Dearborn for a Curator of Collections position. Joel interviewed for a Volunteer Coordinator with Growing Hope in Ypsilanti. You can read more about them in this blog post Joel wrote for the Let’s Save Michigan campaign [I've blogged about their poster contest before].
Other good news is that I got a raise at the herbarium! They’ll also be training me this week on a new position working with the database. I had approached them a few weeks ago about wanting to expand my skill set and take on more challenging work and I’m so happy they’re willing to work with me!
Between all that, grad school & event planning for the SAA group, things have been pretty stressful & awesome lately [hence the lack of blogging].
BUT! I promise the next blog will have lots of interesting cultural/archival stuff & a lot less about my personal life.
Until then, a beautiful quote about the power of books:
