Thursday, September 27, 2012

Alabama Dept. of Archives and History seeks an Electronic Records Archivist

If you have theoretical and real-world knowledge of electronic records and at least two years of professional work experience, would like to live in or near a good-sized Southern city, and relish the thought of interacting wth capable, dedicated, and gracious colleagues, the Alabama Department of Archives and History may have a job for you:
Job Description
The Alabama Department of Archives and History seeks a highly motivated, innovative and collaborative Electronic Records Archivist to lead preservation activities within the organization. Reporting to the head of the Government Services Division, the archivist will be responsible for the acquisition, appraisal, description, management, policy-formation, and preservation of born-digital and imaged records with legal, historical, evidential, research, or administrative value.

This position announcement is not for a technician whose job responsibilities would include scanning records, creating metadata for scanned images, and placing both into a digital assessment management system. Instead the ADAH is looking for a self-motivated, big-picture thinker who can take the current industry best practices regarding electronic records management and preservation and develop a clear, directed program for state and local agency officials to implement.

Requirements
Qualifications
  • Bachelor’s degree in archives/library/information science or a related field with completion of graduate level course work in archives. (A degree specializing in archival science, digital curation, or digital preservation is preferred.) Plus two years of professional experience in archival work and records management in an archival repository.
  • A Driver’s License
Desired Experience
  • Application of archival theory and practice to the management and preservation of electronic records. 
  • Demonstrated experience with repository platforms Windows, Unix, Voyager, ContentDM, and/or LOCKSS.
  • Project management experience as it applies to management of electronic/digital content.
  • Experience generating checksums, creating preservation metadata, and working with tools that verify file authenticity and tools that identify potentially restricted content strongly preferred. 
Consult the position description for detailed salary information and application instructions.  Information about benefits available to Alabama government employees is available through the Alabama State Personnel Department.

If you're interested in applying for this position, be sure to check out the Web site of the Library of Congress-funded Persistent Digital Archives and Library System (PeDALS) project and PeDALS project information maintained by the Library of Congress.  The Alabama Department of Archives and History joined PeDALS well after the project started, but it (and another new partner, the New Mexico State Archives) jumped in, mastered a very steep learning curve, and got a fully functioning LOCKSS system up and running with remarkable speed.  Even though the project is no longer grant-funded, Alabama and several of the PeDALS partners are still expanding and refining the PeDALS system architecture, so take a little time to explore the project's technical components and goals.

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