Society of American Archivists - UT Student Chapter

Society of American Archivists
University of Texas at Austin Student Chapter

Society of American Archivists University of Texas at Austin Student Chapter

2002-2003 Annual Report

During the 2002-2003 year (May 2002-May 2003), the University of Texas at Austin SAA Student Chapter maintained a membership of approximately 25 members. The board for this period consisted of the following officers:

President: Molly Wheeler
Co-Vice Presidents: Stephen Naron and Ben Stone
Secretary: Trish Nugent
Treasurer: Traci Drummond
Events Co-Chairs: Dixie Owen and Erin Lawrimore
Web Chair: Addy Sonder

In May 2002, the new board commenced planning for the Chapter's major annual event, Archives Week. The officers chose to focus on ways that archives are at risk, choosing "Archives Under Attack" as the official title. Through various events during the week, issues of forgery, archives and war, and preservation would be explored. The group raised approximately $3000 for the week, and used the funds to produce print and magnet publicity, fly in and accommodate the key speaker, and hold a reception. Funds were raised by selling mugs (in person and online) with the image and slogan of "Mrs. Eberly Firing the Cannon in the Texas Archives War of 1842," receiving funds from five UT academic departments that wished to co-host the key speaker (Andras Rieldmayer), and by other generous donations. Events during Archives Week 2002: "Archives Under Attack" were:

Wednesday, October 9: "Even I was Appalled at the Possibilities: The Nature and Impact of Documentary Forgery." A talk by Dr. David Gracy, Governor Bill Daniel Professor in Archival Enterprise and Director of the Center for the Cultural Record, School of Information, University of Texas at Austin.
Thursday, October 10: "Archives and Cultural Memory under Fire in the Balkan Wars of the 1990s." A talk by Andras Riedlmayer, Bibliographer in Islamic Art and Architecture, Fine Arts Library, Harvard University. Co-hosted by: Department of Art and Art History, Department of History, School of Information, Center for Russian, East European and Eurasian Studies, and Department of Slavic Languages and Literatures.
Saturday, October 12: "Public Archives Clinic." Held at the Austin History Center and co-hosted by the Austin History Center staff.

Andras Riedlmayer's talk was a huge success, drawing 92 people and a front-page story in the campus daily newspaper on the following day. The Archives Clinic attracted local newspaper and television media and brought in people from the Austin community. Attendees brought in photographs, sound recordings, scrapbooks, textiles and other objects in various states of deterioration, for advice from archives and conservation students and Austin History Center staff on how to preserve them. Literature and supply catalogs were made available. The Archives Week 2002: "Archives Under Attack" website is still viewable at http://www.ischool.utexas.edu/~saa/archivesweek.html.

Other events the Chapter coordinated during the 2002-2003 year include the following:

New website launched
September: Annual SAA Fall Potluck
October: SAA and Preservation Conservation Studies (PCS) Mixer
November: Ray Edmondson, The Southeast Asia-Pacific Audiovisual Archive Association (SEAPAVAA). Ray gave a presentation on issues in managing moving image archives.
November: Richard Pearce-Moses, Director of Digital Government Information, Archives and Public Records Division, Arizona State Library Richard discussed the work he is chairing of revising the glossary of archival terminology published by SAA.
December: Holiday SAA/PCS Party
January: Annual SAA Spring Potluck
February: Mary Taylor, project manager for the Sacramento History Online project. Mary gave a presentation on her experiences in developing this digital library of rare and primary source materials.
April: EAD workshop. Kris Kiesling of the Harry Ransom Center gave a workshop that covered the background and structure of EAD. Students also learned how to use XMetal to encode a finding aid.
April: R. Anthony Reese, an assistant professor of Law at The University of Texas who specializes in copyright, trademark, and internet law, talked about archives and copyright.
April: Elections held for the 2003-2004 SAA-UT Board
May: End of Year Potluck

Additionally, members of the board agreed to create and submit a poster for the 2003 SAA annual conference's student poster session.

In summary, this year was a very successful year for the SAA-UT Student Chapter. Archives Week continues to gain broader recognition and increased attendance. Due to the broad interdisciplinary appeal of speaker Andras Riedlmayer, the board successfully solicited funding and sponsorship from several academic departments, something never done before. The officers of the board hope that this continues, as archives' relevance to other disciplines is important. The board raised funds for next year so that the chapter can continue to sponsor a variety of activities for the UT and Austin communities.

Respectfully submitted,

Molly Wheeler

President

SAA-UT Student Chapter, 2002-2003

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Society of American Archivists - University of Texas at Austin Student Chapter
E-mail: saa@ischool.utexas.edu