Behind the Scenes in Special Collections

Front Row: L to R: Dallas Reiber, Christina Molina, Ian Baldwin,Kayla McDuffieSecond Row: L to R: Karla Irwin, Hana Guiterrez, Lindsay Oden, and Hannah Robinson. Not pictured: Jocelyn Ascensio

Special Collections is excited to be in the early phases of implementing ArchivesSpace, a new collection management application that provides us with the ability to manage and store all our collection guides, also known as finding aids, in one place. Our implementation of ArchivesSpace will result in increased public access to our collection guides. In preparation for launching the user interface of the application, Special Collections is busy populating ArchivesSpace with existing finding aids, as well as some brand new ones. Currently, Special Collections is lucky to have six new UNLV student employees to work in ArchivesSpace this summer: Ian Baldwin, Hana Gutierrez, Kayla McDuffie, Lindsay Oden, Dallas Reiber and Hannah Robinson. In addition, two of our existing student employees, Jocelyn Ascencio and Christina Molina are also contributing to ArchivesSpace on an ongoing basis. The students are modifying our collection descriptions to meet current professional standards and entering the descriptions into ArchivesSpace. Their combined efforts will make our collections more discoverable—they are inputting a number of collection inventories that have never before been accessible to the public online. In only ten weeks' time, the students are completing work that would have taken our staff many months to finish, so we are very grateful for their energy and accomplishments! In the coming weeks the students will be blogging about their adventures in UNLV Special Collections, so stay tuned!

~ Karla Irwin, Special Collections Librarian

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