DAS Subcommittee Meeting
October 8 – 9, 2015
Chicago, IL
Minutes DRAFT
Present: Mahnaz Ghaznavi Chair, Liz Bishoff, Lori Lindberg, Glen McAninch, Thomas Rosko, Sybil Schaefer, and Cynthia Ghering via phone off and on; Solveig De Sutter, Director of Education; Mia Capodilupo, and Brianne Downing, Education Coordinators.
Thursday, October 8
8:00 am to 7:00 pm
Ghaznavi welcomed everyone and proceeded to give an update of the education meeting in Cleveland.
- Council approved the A&D Certificate Program. There won’t be an exam, but the structure mirrors the DAS Program in all other aspects. The list of courses includes DAS courses that will count for both programs.
- Audience is narrower, but there is a need for A&D since schools don’t address it in depth. It will also fill a gap for students needing on the job training in certain processing positions.
- May want to review report on job descriptions for digital archivists.
- Coalition of Archives, Libraries, and Museums (CALAM) continues to proceed with various initiatives and they’ve just received an additional grant to continue. It’s still very hard to keep track of ‑ SAA currently has three members and De Sutter – keeping track and interacting whenever time allows.
- Schaefer to compare costs of DAS vs. Simmons and different programs (is that correct?)
- Bishoff suggested getting CALAM’s analysis of the Mapping the Landscape before doing anything to find out who competition is.
- Ghaznavi suggested revisiting the DAS Strategic Plan and break it into action items.
- De Sutter shared that we are significantly down in our projected revenues for fall 2015, and while we can’t make it all up, we should get close.
- De Sutter updated the group on the CoSA/Preservica partnership and because the courses that they are developing overlap significantly with DAS. Since CoSA received grant money and Preservica is supplying the technical side, they are able to offer these courses at no cost or very low cost – making them serious competition. Some DAS SC members felt that CoSA courses don’t have the cache of DAS and has a different audience.
- DAS SC needs a new members since Beth Shields resigned. List of everyone who volunteered for the DAS SC is available. Committee felt that there needs to be a more transparent process about selecting DAS SC members.
- The following criteria was created for new DAS SC members:
- Electronic records experience/digital experience
- Knowledge
- DAS is the first choice (among committee choices)
- Training/teaching experience
- Diversity
- Fills an area of expertise not currently present on SC (e.g. A/V, Lone Arranger, GIS)
- Diversity in professional setting (e.g. historical societies, museums, corporate/nonprofit)
- Ability to come to SC meetings twice a year
- Time commitment
- DAS certificate holder (desired/nice to have)
- Martzahl called in, and the group looked at the statistics in the Dolan report. Course question breakdown is mapped to Exam. Change in course breakdown throughout exam is due to trying to keep the percentages equal among tiers. Only one question from the current test is problematic enough to need to be revised early, others can be spread out over time. Decision was made that the combination of hard, easy, and unusual items was acceptable.
- Report shows a question revision schedule. Exam is weighted so face-to-face courses give more advantage on the exam, which brings up issue of participants taking the max number of webinars to cut down on expense and travel.
- Question quality is getting better – only 15 made it on to tables this time. Significantly less rewrites are needed.
- Quick review of problem questions with Veronica. Tables – Table 1= too hard, table 2=too easy, Table 3=better prepared people do worse. Fewer people in Table 3 this time – impossible not to have any questions show up in tables, but want number to decrease which it is.
Action Items for November Call:
- Check course questions starting on Page 5 – 10 for “egregious errors or issues; if they are generally passable, then we can review them in context with their courses.
Action Items for December Call:
Add one question to each, Day One and Day Two of Digital Forensics.
- Add questions for F05, Overview of Metadata as pilots.
- Review questions for F01, F02, and TST01 at the December call (Ghering);
Refer to Martzahl report for subsequent actions - we’ll refer to them in future call agendas.
Bishoff voiced concern over requiring students to only take nine classes (especially when they take mostly webinars) and the Exam covers more than that. We note on the DAS page that it’s possible to take mostly webinars if you have the knowledge and that 90-minute webinars are not a substitute for face to face courses. Mcaninch felt a possible solution is to make webinars more interactive and perhaps they show they’ve read ahead of time. Lindberg shared that someone she knows (not an archivist) was able to pass the Exam by taking mostly webinars and working her way through the pre-readings. We should be able to say “if you are taking this course, here’s a comprehensive reading list. De Sutter offered to send a list to instructors and have them decide which readings.
Staff update
There were no questions about the report so De Sutter highlighted that:
- Education enrollment is significantly down in the first half of FY 16 due to lack of soliciting course sponsors aggressively, ARL courses are tapering off, and some proposals didn’t go through.
- We are trying to pitch week-long blocks of courses in different regions, because that seems to get a better response.
Course updates:
- PREMIS – Got bad reviews at SAA 2015, need to develop a different version with different instructors, maybe more of a Fundamentals/introduction class. Possible instructors – Kelcy Shepherd, Evelyn McClelland (designed PREMIS output, very busy, Sibyl knows her).
- Metadata Overview – worked with Shawn Averkamp to redesign webinar. Definitions/glossary was an issue. Glossary was not contemporary in terms of metadata definitions. Chris Prom helped a lot. Evals were good – need updates on exam.
- Digital Forensics: Fundamentals and Advanced – Content is better, but there are still issues. Too dense especially in the advanced course. Slides are too text-heavy, Mac environment is an issue. Course assumes too much knowledge on the part of participants, Cal is highly technical. Idea – webinar/course on how computers work. Suggestion that maybe DFA should be phased out since it’s not very practical. The fundamentals course is much more useful. Could replace/ partner with Bitcurator to develop a hands-on course? Compile summary offering a course in hardware?
- Providing Access: Martzahl developed the webinar, followed by a half-day course which was not offered as planned due to time constraints – needs more exercises? It is scheduled in OR in the spring. Bishoff will audit, Schaefer will be new liaison. Put on next call agenda.
- CRADLE – was not received well and group agreed on the need to develop a new course. Schaefer suggested a new developer/instructor, David Miner, Head of Research Data Curation at UCSD. Schaefer will approach him.
- Web Archiving Fundamentals – Anna Perricci from Columbia is developer/presenter. Multi-module class, participants will view three 20-minute videos, complete the exam, and have the option to participate in a live Q&A session with Perricci. Videos will be available Nov. 16 and people will have access for 2 months. January 16 is the date for the live session. Plan to follow up with an intensive in-person course on specific tools such as Archive-it.
- XML course – Ghaznavi and De Sutter talked to Ricc Ferrante and agreed to retire the course. Ferrante and his group will develop a new course with focus on EPAC – new title is Preservation Strategies for Email Archiving.
- ADER – Going well, was updated in February.
- Introduction to Processing Digital Records and Manuscripts went very well.
- Idea – Audit/Certification webinar – replacement for TRAC, Sibyl may be able to develop.
- Thinking Digital – last updated in 2013, includes digitization and should really be all born digital. ?????????
- RFPs – Ghering is revising and will do so in concert with Lindberg.
- Appraisal – Reviews note emphasis on government records environment. Maybe Meyers could divide people into groups for exercises. De Sutter has a list of faculty options; McAninch would be willing to teach if no instructor is found.
Mapping the DAS curriculum:
Not many courses on outreach and it’s not built into many of the courses. Also could add primary and secondary ACE categories. Liaison can review what instructor picks as part of shepherding and leave comments on microsite.
ACE and competencies are correlated, but not 1:1. Competencies should be revised every 3 years at minimum, DAS SC should review, don’t necessarily have to change.
- ACE categories reviewed every 5 years.
- Competencies should be reviewed every three years.
Next steps:
- Review recommendations from the report. We don’t want too much overlap, but many people come to courses unprepared and skill levels vary widely.
- List of DAS key terms – where should it go? Glossary has morphed into Dictionary, everyone should submit terms and they will go through the Dictionary Working Group’s process of being updated. Forward current list to the group.
The “What you should know” section of the description should include language along the lines of: To get the most out of this course, you should be familiar with the following concepts/terms or bibliography. Link or point to glossary, if not in glossary then submit/state source.
Liaison Checklist
Descriptions aren’t all complete and it’s the liaison’s responsibility to that instructors provide following:
- Terms for Glossary
- Learning outcomes
- ACE/competencies
- Bibliography/pre-readings
- 5. What you should know
- 6. Works cited/pages referenced
- 7. Faculty recommendations
Liaisons need to work with instructors to ensure that question writing/exam content is in sync with revisions and updated versions. Group agreed that the liaisons can get this done in time for the February meeting. De Sutter to set up calls if necessary, and Ghaznavi to send out a “heads up” email to faculty.
Courses to be retired:
- Thinking Digital
- Basic Electronic Records
Criteria for retiring course:
- It’s out of date
- It’s infrequently requested
- It’s infrequently reviewed
Courses to be revamped:
- Research Data Curation
- XML – EPADS
- Intro to PREMIS
A development process and checklist chart was created (Attachment)
New course proposals and suggestions:
- McAninch Proposal – Preservation for Audio and Video Formats - includes list of tools and common problems, proprietary formats. Maybe introduction to Audio preservation. He will look at FADGI and AMIA videos/webinars in developing it. Concern about media-specific formats.
- POWRR Proposal - Brad Houston audited – DAS SC is interested in collaboration w/ entities that already produce webinars or instruction to avoid reinventing the wheel duplicate. McAninch found education a bit elementary, but there is a wide variety of tools. Would recommend w/ tweaking. Consists of semi-experienced people trying to develop model out of things they don’t have access to – also have multiple instructors, how would that work for SAA? Could be a good way to target small institutions. De Sutter and McAninch will schedule some calls and talk to Brad.
- Using Command Line Interface – Schaefer – has an instructor in mind. Demand would be similar to DFA, very useful in daily work, concern that is very dependent on which computer is being used.
- NEDCC – possible partnership, explore link to their website
- . Focuses more on digitization, but moving into digital. Lower cost – no membership prices.
Next Meeting – Feb 23&24 in Chicago
Conference Call Schedule:
November 16; December 1, January 12, March 8, April 12, May 10.
Agenda for November call includes:
Comprehensive Exam action item
Go through strategic plan and assign goals and dates for 2016.
Adjournment
