The following is a guest post by Barrie Howard, IT project manager at the Library of Congress.
The Digital Preservation Outreach and Education (DPOE) program is pleased to announce the successful completion of another train-the-trainer workshop in 2015. The most recent workshop took place in Sacramento, California, from September 22th–25th. This domestic training event follows closely behind two workshops held in Australia in late spring.
The Library of Congress partnered with the State Library of California to host the three-and-a-half day workshop to increase the knowledge and skills of working professionals, who are charged with providing long-term access to digital content. Planning and events management support were provided by the California Preservation Program (CPP), which provides consultation, information resources, and preservation services to archives, historical societies, libraries, and museums across the state.
This cohort of trainers was highly energized at the completion of the workshop, and left the event buzzing with plans to band together to establish a statewide effort to guarantee long-term, enduring access to California’s collective cultural heritage captured in digital formats. The workshop’s train-the-trainer model inspired the participants to think about how they could work across jurisdictional and organizational boundaries to meet the needs of all California cultural heritage institutions, especially small organizations with very few staff.
CPP Steering Committee Chair Barclay Ogden set the stage by stating, “I’m looking forward to the DPOE workshop to position a cohort of California librarians, archivists, and history museum curators to educate and advocate for statewide digital preservation services. California’s smaller memory institutions need help with digital preservation.
DPOE Program Director George Coulbourne led the week-long workshop. Veteran anchor instructors Mary Molinaro (University of Kentucky Libraries) and Jacob Nadal (The Research Collections and Preservation Consortium) and the I joined the instructor team for the first time. We provided presentations throughout the week and facilitated hands-on activities.
The enthusiasm and vision captured at the workshop are a legacy, rather than merely an outcome, that participants carry with them as they join a vibrant network of practitioners in the broader digital preservation community. DPOE continues to nurture the network by providing an email distribution list so practitioners can share information about digital preservation best practices, services, and tools, and to surface stories about their experiences in advancing digital preservation. DPOE also maintains a training calendar as a public service to help working professionals discover professional development opportunities in the practice of digital preservation. The calendar is updated regularly, and includes training events hosted by DPOE trainers, as well as others.