Candidate Statements and Biographies for 2013 Elections

We have three candidates for EAD Roundtable Co-Chair this year and three candidates for 2 available Steering Committee Member positions.  Please read the following candidate statements and don't forget to cast your votes!

Co-Chair candidates:

Jodi Allison-Bunnell

Biography:  Jodi Allison-Bunnell is the Program Manager for Northwest Digital Archives, an EAD finding aid program of the Orbis Cascade Alliance. She is one of the founders of NWDA and has worked with the group in one capacity or another since 2001. Prior to that, she held positions at the University of Montana and the University of Maryland. She has an MLA and an MA from the University of Maryland and a BA from Whitman College.

Statement of interest:  Once EAD 3.0 is released this year, I will be highly involved with my consortium's implementation of the new standard. In support of that, and in the interest of sharing our activities as broadly as possible, I'm eager to lead the EAD roundtable. My experience leading and coordinating groups, engaging in intentional communication, and constructing useful meeting agendas position me well for the position. Also, I'm eager for an excuse to relate closely to others who can tell (and laugh at) jokes that integrate EAD, and to promulgate the use of the <eadid> song.

Krista Ferrante

Biography:  Krista Ferrante is currently the Collections Archivist at the Institute Archives and Special Collections at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge, Massachusetts where she encodes, processes collections, handles acquisitions and records management. She has been on the EAD roundtable steering committee since 2010. She previously worked at the Harvard University Library at Houghton, Tufts University Digital Collections and Archives and the American Antiquarian Society. Krista Ferrante has her MLIS from Simmons College, BA from University of Massachusetts Amherst and is the mother of two girls.

Statement of interest:  This is a time of huge transition for the archival community, especially in the ways we are capturing information about our collections. From ArchivesSpace to the new version of EAD, we are working hard to provide the best access possible through metadata and cataloging. Working with the co-chairs and steering committee, I will continue communications during this time of development and work closely with the Technical Subcommittee on Encoded Archival Description to seek feedback from the user community and foster implementation. I will also do my best to support the work to implement and create tools for EAC-CPF. My hope is to be a part of a roundtable that is innovative and open to all possible means for creating discoverable collections.

Susan Potts McDonald

Biography:  Susan Potts McDonald is Coordinator of Arrangement and Description Services in the Manuscript, Archives, and Rare Book Library at Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia. She manages all aspects of accessioning, arrangement, and description including the creation of MARC bibliographic records and EAD finding aids. Prior to coming to Emory, she worked at the Florida State Archives for thirteen years where she was Supervisor of the Arrangement and Description Unit. She has served as Chair of the Manuscript Repositories Section, member of the Technical Subcommittee on Archival Descriptive Standards, and a member of the Standards Committee. Susan, along with Pam Hackbart-Dean, currently teach the SAA Arrangement and Description of Manuscript Collections workshops.

Statement of interest:  My passion for archives has always been in arrangement and description. Back in 1997, when the beta version of EAD was released, I realized that archival description would never be the same! A new set of innovative and challenging tasks lay ahead if we were to successfully implement EAD. Luckily for me, the EAD community has always had a generous and helpful spirit. There is more important work ahead of us as we prepare to migrate to the next version of EAD, await the release of ArchivesSpace, and look at creative ways to implement EAC-CPF. I look forward to the possibility of collaboratively working toward these goals and helping archivists embrace these emerging descriptive standards and best practices.

 

Steering Committee candidates:

Elise Dunham

Biography / Statement of interest:  I am a recent graduate of the Simmons College Graduate School of Library and Information Science, and I am eager to bring my experience with and passion for EAD and archival description to the Society of American Archivists Encoded Archival Description Roundtable as a member of the Steering Committee. I continually apply and build upon my knowledge of EAD as an encoder and quality control volunteer with the Leveraging Encoded Archival Description Skills (LEADS) Project, a retrospective conversion project at Simmons College. Always recognizing that the ultimate purpose of standardization is to facilitate widespread access to archival collections, I am excited to make active contributions that will further the mission and goals of the EAD Roundtable.

Suzanne Maggard

Biography:  Suzanne Maggard is Reference/Collections Librarian at the University of Cincinnati. Since the beginning of her career in 2006, she has worked with EAD to help facilitate access to numerous archival collections at both the Filson Historical Society and the University of Cincinnati. Currently at the University of Cincinnati, she coordinates the conversion of finding aids to EAD using the OhioLINK EAD tool and trains staff and students in the use of EAD and DACS. In 2011, she was appointed to the OhioLINK EAD Task Force which manages this statewide EAD repository and she is currently serving as co-chair of the OhioLINK EAD Task Force. She holds an MA in United States History from the University of Cincinnati, and a MSLS from the University of Kentucky. She is a member of the Society of American Archivists, the Midwest Archives Conference, and the Society of Ohio Archivists, and she is currently leading an effort to organize a roundtable of archivists in the Cincinnati and Northern Kentucky area. Suzanne has presented on the topic of EAD at professional conferences, including the Midwest Archives Conference and the Academic Library Association of Ohio.

Statement of interest:  The rapidly changing world of archival description must embrace revisions to EAD and DACS and experimentations with EAC-CPF and linked data while still facing the challenge of limited financial and human resources. Collaboration and training offer archivists the tools to handle these developments effectively. As a member of the EAD Roundtable Steering Committee, I will seek ways to increase collaborative opportunities among archivists, whether that is with EAD consortiums or individual institutions. I will also encourage affordable continuing education for archivists interested in EAD and related descriptive formats. I look forward to the opportunity to work with members of the EAD Roundtable to meet the needs of archivists using EAD.

Laura Starratt

Biography / Statement of interest:  Laura Starratt is a manuscript archivist at Emory University's Manuscript, Archives, and Rare Book Library (MARBL). Before that, she was an archivist at the Kenan Research Center at the Atlanta History Center. She completed her undergraduate work at Florida Atlantic University in English Literature and earned a master's degree in Information Science at the University of Tennessee. In her new role at Emory, she has been working more and more with EAD, learning about both the benefits and issues that come with the standard. EAD and its implementation is so beneficial in garnering access to materials that she feels it is important to make this a priority and is excited about working to that goal.