Meeting Minutes: September 2014

DAS Subcommittee Meeting

September 18-19, 2014

17 North State Street, Suite 820, Chicago, IL

Present: Liz Bishoff, Mahnaz Ghaznavi (chair), Cynthia Ghering, Veronica Martzahl, Glen McAninch, Tom Rosko, Sibyll Schaefer, members.  Solveig De Sutter, Mia Capodilupo, Ania Jaroszek, staff.

1. Ghaznavi started the meeting at 8:30 am with introductions and welcomed new members Ghering and Schaefer. 

Overview of the DAS program followed – where are we and what needs to be done.  Up to this point, development has been reactive – committee did not realize how popular the program would be. We need to develop a strategic plan for the next 3-5 years. To inform the plan, Bishoff and Martzahl will create a survey of DAS instructors and Lindberg/Bishoff will develop a survey of DAS Certificate Holders who completed the program in August 2013.  Surveys will be 5-6 questions and will go out through Survey Monkey.

Ideas for Faculty/Student Survey Questions:

• What has DAS helped you to do professionally – did you advance in your career? Have your responsibilities changed? New job? Change in job description, lead a new project, trained others?
• What gaps do you still have in knowledge of digital archives?
• Would you recommend DAS courses?
• Is DAS your go-to for continuing education?
• What went well during the certificate program? What could change?
• What was the impact of DAS on your institution?
• Should do interviews/focus groups with supervisors and institutions with large numbers of people participating in DAS for the strategic plan – found not feasible with timelines and resources.

Ideas for Faculty Survey Questions:

• Relationship of faculty to institution (are they supported)
• What are barriers to development and maintenance of courses?
• How can DAS Subcommittee support instructors? (onboarding info – create webpage?)
• Can the committee help instructors to write exam questions correctly?
• What faculty tools have you used?
• Who would you recommend for other instructors?
• Glossary – which of the tools have they used?
• Why are you an instructor?
• Suggestions for training –

What do we want to get out of this – provide better tools; asses how we can support faculty better; template for description; learning objective, how to frame questions?  Submit a grant for faculty development?

Open surveys from Halloween – Thanksgiving and tabulate results for the Dec. Conference call.

We need to train our developers and faculty on webinar presentations and develop Train the Trainer sessions that should be offered free to all DAS faculty. Ghering will research free web production videos/materials. Suggestions included applying for a program development grant through NEH – may cover technology infrastructure, diversifying, recruiting and supporting faculty. Need to contact program officer and figure out ownership of course materials.

1. Stream of consciousness…

• In five years – you might be no longer need to be a digital archivist?  Will it be assumed that “Archivists” encompasses the digital specialist part and you’ll need more sophisticated highly developed courses where pre-requisites for those courses will be enforced?
• Develop more sophisticated session at annual meetings…
• Who will be the audience?
• What is relationship to graduate schools?  There was a session at SAA in DC where a survey by  “Jane?” was presented

1. Ghaznavi gave a quick overview of the DC Faculty Session and everyone who was there agreed it was a success and provided many insights.  She’ll tweak her DC presentation and it will be posted to the Faculty Microsite.

1. We now have an “Education Resource Committee” (ERC) that resulted from DAS SC’s request for more recourses and CoE’s subsequent recommendation to SAA Council.  ERC will investigate what is required to maintain and grow the current education program. It’s made up of three members (Ciaran, Sanett, Yakel) and three staff members (Black, Carlson, De Sutter) The staff group has met three times already to map workflow and to differentiate what would be provided via an  Association Content System (CMS) and a Learning Management System (LMS) since there is no one system that can accommodate all requirements.  ERC reports to CoE in February 2015 and will need the information DAS SC is putting together in its strategic plan.

• In view of ERC, it was decided that previous considerations about Intern projects and perimeters was no longer relevant.

The SAA Council meeting was moved to November this year.  ERC needs to submit its recommendations to the Committee on Education (CoE) by end of January and DSC needs to “feed” ERC an outline of its strategic plan by beginning of January.  Bishoff strongly recommended working on the strategic plan in person with at least 1.5 days devoted to it – need to decide if we should use a template, risk assessment, SWOT analysis, etc. Mission/vision need to be updated, DACE report reviewed, etc.  Group decided to complete the plan during its mid-winter meeting.

1.  CoE selected existing Arrangement and Description courses/workshops and identified gaps to form an A&D program track – following the DAS structure except for the Comprehensive Exam.  So CMS/LMS implementation is key.  We are also pursuing development of more non-DAS CE webinars.

New committee members asked how the A&D track concept was arrived at because this is a topic that is taught in graduate archival education programs.  Their colleagues explained that this would benefit, archivists who need a refresher or need to specialize, librarians who haven’t studied archives; non archivists asked to start an archives, local historical societies and municipalities with tight resources, and because many schools teach to the  academic environment.

1. DAS SC decided at its last meeting that more webinars in the Tools & Services tier and more course/exam maintenance is needed.

Tools and Services courses discussion:

All Tools & Services courses have tech infrastructure issues, sandbox would really help:

It is hard to teach tech skills through PowerPoint, you need hands on exercises but there are many issues with downloading, running software, permissions, etc. All of the DAS tools are open source and most archives are in a Microsoft environment because it is easier to standardize, secure and maintain.

We need to offer more sophisticated, complex courses down the road which require computer lab environments. To require lab environment for these courses would limit the range of locations where they could be scheduled. 

It’s challenging to get instructors to develop webinar/courses, follow through and get them to stick to the timeline…maybe add questions on making it easier to survey. Also need to make sure that all courses use the SAA Directory in a consistent way.

Suggestions:

• Best Practice Tools
• What to do with Microsoft
• IT pp. prefer standardized environments – let’s look at what we do right now

1. Webinar Discussion

As noted before, we need to grow Tier 3 webinars; however, to do this, the education department needs more infrastructures – a sandbox or Amazon hosting so that course participants can get demo software and practice without downloading. Think about incorporating vendor webinars into smaller “add on” segments to larger concept webinars.

Start providing evaluations for online on demand webinars.

Intro webinar needed to introduce the program given for free;

Give partial credits for webinars as soon as possible

Think about tool and services development RFP?

Before soliciting Tier 3 webinars, go through courses to see what tools are used by instructors and start with RFPs on that basis.

How do we teach webinars on tools?

Screen sharing – instructor would be using the hosted environment; for students to participate, the sandbox would be necessary.

Discussion about sponsorships – offer an educational program and ask vendors to present their products as individual short webinars (similar to annual meeting presentations) that would be low cost or free. Or, we could present a “case study” of a University or company that uses a particular product – how they use it, etc. Contact institutions and ask how you use Archivemetica, etc.

Webinar – 90 minutes and then short add ons?

Sponsors/vendors get to do a product presentation but it can’t be sales; it’s beneficial to learn about their product category presented from the vendors – free tools Overview.

1. Individual course exams are in need of revision.  Some CoE members volunteered with exam writing at their last call.  After thorough discussion, DAS SC felt that was problematic; for example DAS Certificate Holders working on exams that they might take for Certificate renewal.    

The group decided that too many people involved made the process too difficult to keep track of, and that one person should oversee and report on question writing and review – someone outside the DAS SC and/or CoE.  Martzahl volunteered to be that person, noting that she is slated to go off the committee in August 2015, would be happy to stay connected with DAS SC in that way, and participate in phone calls.  She also volunteered to find a free online database to store questions and exam versions for all exams including the Comp Exam.  Staff will need to be trained to work with the database as well.

Everyone thought it was a great idea though much sadness was expressed at the thought of losing such a productive/wonderful member of the group!

1. August Comprehensive Examination Results and Statistics – the group discussed increasing the difficulty of questions deemed easy and to decrease the discrepancy between the (Lori/Sibyll – you said it much for elegant – can you remember?) ratios that measure what a person should answer correctly if they answered specific answers correctly.  That was followed by a discussion about the way the exam creation process e.g. rated in relationship to students’ likelihood of choosing the correct answer.

Passing threshold is low at 64%. Sandy Dolan suggested targeting items near the pass/fail mark and making them harder to make the entire test harder.  Debate over whether test should be harder and whether more people should fail - need to find out what happened with people who failed, what courses did they take, etc. Also concern about confusion over statistics.

Analyze who got below 75 and what courses they took (parking lot)

Several items that were eliminated during the last test review were included with the Aug. test, and the group felt they didn’t have enough information to make decisions to edit the exam. De Sutter will reach out to Sandy and ask her to:

• Please provide an analysis of the pilot questions
• How have our exam results changed over time
• Could you give us a list of actionable items for next steps in plain English

There was debate/purpose over the value of the DAS Comp exam because it muddles the concept of a Certificate Program and appears more like Certification.  As long as individual exams are open book (equals easy) and registrants get the correct answers after they take the exams, it was agreed we should keep the Comp Exam to retain credibility.  Think about phasing it out down the road if specific courses were required for everyone and webinars were weighted differently, e.g. not as much as a course; OR do a Certification program.

Instead of writing content as previously discussed, a better job for the Education Committee volunteers would be to go through the course content and/or glossary and make sure the terms that are uses are consistent with the Directory.  Where there are new terms or there is a question of interpretation, volunteers should submit these to the directory group for approval so language is consistent throughout SAA.

10.  Suggestion of revisiting the Core competencies and learning outcomes was discussed and a review could be done during the strategic planning process.

11.  Liaison Course Reports:

BER (Martzahl) - it’s out of sync; take a look at description and learning outcomes; Ghering is new liaison - maybe find another person to revise;

Send evals; Scrutinize after revisions

Metadata (Bishoff) – needs updating – someone suggested “Avercamp and Cronen from Chicago?”  I know that’s not right.  Please let me know how it’s spelled.

Appraisal (McAninch) – still working on transforming it from theoretical to more hands on and digital; Meyers is in process of revising; exam will need review based on revision; need to review questions.  Instructors, McAninch and De Sutter met at the conference to rewrite exam questions.

Digital Curation:  Creating an Environment for Success (Ghaznavi) – the foundational course is being revised by Condon, McGovern, Smith, and Tibbo.  The original had a lot of transformational content and this revision is supposed to get it in sync with the transformational course.  We haven’t seen the product yet and there is concern about this becoming a DiggCurr or DPoe - like course (Tibbo and McGovern are the developers of these offerings).  We’ve been told that the two courses should not be scheduled back to back; rather, people should take the foundational and acquire more knowledge before taking the Digital Curation:  Planning and Sustainable Futures course. 

Would be helpful to develop an OAIS webinar as a preface/pre-requisite to this course (or direct people to the CoSA one – free on website) – Ghering will help Ghaznavi with shepherding responsibilities.

Digital Curation:  Planning and Sustainable Futures (McAninch) – in view of earlier discussion about the revisions to the Digital Curation courses, we should get a second pair to teach (but will credit McGovern & Tibbo). Heather Moulaison and Edward Corrado were suggested.

Processing Digital Records and Manuscripts (McAninch/Lindberg) – general webinar about analyzing work processes being developed by Gordon Daines based on the module he wrote for Pubs. McAninch, Lindberg, and Prom have reviewed and made suggestions.  The new draft was just distributed and Schaefer just signed on to review as well since there seems to be confusion in regard to where this fits in and how to market it. Needs actual examples.

De Sutter will provide Schaefer with the information that preceded this draft for context and then schedule a call with McAninch, Lindberg, and Schaefer.

Fundamentals of Digital Forensics (Ghaznavi) – will be a foundational one-day course that will be required before taking the two-day Digital Forensics course which will concentrate on more hands-on and will go into more depth with concepts that are presently presented.

Electronic Records… the Next Step (Ghering) - Do we still need this webinar?  Is it still relevant? Ghering will evaluate the content and contact Meyer to see if he can revise. 

Accessioning and Ingest (McAninch) – after the initial turmoil, the reviews have been excellent.  Course in good shape overall, exam should be looked at but since it has been tweaked, it’s not as high on the list as others.

Discussed Perke’s conflict with teaching; for strategic planning and survey, what are the incentives for – high caliber instructors and what to expect in the future; perhaps we need to find another instructor.

Digital Repositories (Rosko) – needs to be updated and Lindberg (instructor) will work with Rosko to get that done.  De Sutter to schedule a call.

Legal Issues Courses – CIDA&PIDA (Rosko) – Instructors are still in the process of updating/revising content and exams as they teach the courses.  The presentation/PowerPoint has been improved and it’s going in the right direction.

RFPs (Lindberg) – was updated every time based on evaluations and just added ISO standards.  Would be good to have a second instructor that could teach if needed. And, after discussion about the low demand for this course, name will be changed to Developing Specifications and RFPs. Bishoff is available to teach if it’s an emergency.

Digital Archives and Libraries (Bishoff) – PowerPoint needs most up to date version; Rosko to provide.  Correlate questions to changes;

Providing Access (Martzahl) – getting a developer has been very challenging, and there have been numerous attempts to find a developer. Ghering and Martzahl will join to develop the webinar.

Inreach and Outreach (Rosko) – very low demand but a great course.  It also needs a new title Building Advocacy and Support for Digital Archives so students understand better what it’s about.  De Sutter to arrange a conference call with Eaton and Rosko.

XML (Ghaznavi) – addresses a real need to preserve email, but is too complex and scary, not general enough and not specific enough but people need to have knowledge of XML. Maybe require a webinar before? There is one from W3C Schools.

Webinar Suggestion– Introduction to Preserving Email - T&S tier; (McAninch/Ghaznavi shepherds).  Solicit RFP for a one-day course. 

• Morning:
• Introduction to broader issues with email (level of management; working within your environment)
• Problems/issues/transitions between user and storage
• Examples of policies and procedures
• Afternoon:
• Examples of implementations
• XML
• mbox/pst
• using native functionality of email systems
• records management systems utilizations

Archival Content Management Systems (Martzahl) – is being updated by Rachel Onuf and scheduled for November 4.  Title should be changed to Collection Management Systems

Ask Rachel to include links to the videos for various

When you use it, why, how it fits in with various functions-   categorizing tools, what kind of

Digital Forensics (Ghaznavi) – will be a two-day course instead of Part 1 and Part 2, with the new intro course a standalone. Students must take both days.

PDF/A – (McAninch) - two new updates since development; Version 3 is coming out…principle is important; Adobe’s approach is not the solution – alternative is to create in PDF… revise…very useful to students but needs updating. McAninch will contact Geof to see if he is available (is that correct?)

Viewshare (Lindberg) – interesting tool but doesn’t have much to do with digital archives and the presenter was not good.   Take it off the list. 

Premis (Martzahl) – staff gets requests but original presentation lacked hands-on (how is it implemented in different places?). and there may have been language issues.  De Sutter would like to revamp and offer at the Cleveland 2015 Conference. Needs another instructor to work with Karin – Rebecca Gunther suggested. 

Info Architecture (Martzahl) – needs to be revised and should be changed to User Centered Design… using strategies of Information Architecture.  Marty Herst & Ghaznavi?

Managing Electronic Records in Archives and Special Collections (Ghering) – was revised in 2014 and gets good reviews.

Curating Research Assets and Data Using Lifecycle Education (needs a liaison) – was developed and taught as a pre-conference by Tibbo and an assistant in DC.  Material delivery at the last moment prevented staff from submitting the content to DAS SC.  Will disseminate the evaluation summary as soon as it’s processed. Suggested Ardys Kozbial from (DRUCA?) as possible reviewer.

CRADLE? – Concern about McGovern/Tibbo “owning” DCU. Need to review evaluations, maybe VM can help with test writing.

12.  Discussion about evaluations – the decrease in completed forms since we switched to Survey Monkey.

Evaluations for the pre-conferences were done in paper to get more results and we did; however, we still don’t have all of them because they are so labor intensive. 

Group would prefer to – go back to paper;

Capodilupo explain difficulties with the process and Ghering offered to get them tabulated! 

Staff needs to scan evals and set them up as PDFs, send URL to Ghering and her staff will process.

(Cynthia – I butchered this – can you fill in?)

Send rosters along with evals and

13.  Faculty Listserv – “Course management” advocate more links in descriptions to make students aware of “xyz” is presented more in depth in “xyz” course. 

14.   MSC:       

Web page to submit course suggestions

Online Forum for students about what they want…

Cloud service hosting = $5,000; then maintenance

Send links to all PMN webinars

Send last three summaries and results of exams to Sibyll for her courses.

Due to holidays/winter, committee will not be able to meet prior to CoE, so Ghaznavi and McAninch will work together to come up with a strategic plan draft by January 26 with overall goals, objectives, status report starting from the DACE report to today.  

Dates for mid-winter meeting:  3/5 – 3/6/15 or 2/19 – 2/20/15 pending Martzahl’s availability.

Adjourned at Noon