There has been a rise of Accessioning job postings and literature in the field recently, with publication of “Archival Accessioning” and IMLS funded work to create a Best Practices for accessioning. This session will hear from 3 institutions that have recently implemented a new Accessioning Program and/or recently hired an Accessioning Archivist for the first time, with perspectives shared from both the supervisor of accessioning work and the archivist in the accessioning role. Lessons learned, recommendations for integrating an accessioning archivist into existing workflows, and roadblocks we ran into will all be shared. Additionally, these are some of the questions the group aims to address:
- How are processing and accessioning related/separate?
- How does a processing foundation influence accessioning work, and how can that base be used in Onboarding/training?
- What skills can these accessioning archivists take into their next role, and what exactly is career progression for an accessioning archivist?
- How are legacy issues being addressed when there is a new approach to creating accession information and gathering data about collections that especially seeks to highlight historically underrepresented voices?
- What should institutions of various sizes/staffing structures take away from this “trend” in larger academic archives?
