Welcome to 2020! News from your NDSA
Greetings one and all. For starters, happy (belated) new year! We have had a lot on the burners this past year and 2020 will be no different. Here are some highlights (past and present):
Governance
We took a long and deep look at our overall governance structure. But what does that mean, exactly? Well, this time last year parts of the Coordinating Committee were meeting weekly to refocus our documentation and structure of our various components: Coordinating Committee, Interest Groups, Working Groups, etc. What we realized is that though good work was getting done, there was not coordination among all the various efforts. In other words, we were missing opportunities to leverage all the great talent from our Membership. We set out to create a structure that changes all that. In 2020, you will see new, publicly available, documentation of the various groups, their charges, and their focus for 2020. This will help us be accountable to you for all the great work that is going on. Stay tuned for more information on that!
NDSA Agenda
The long-awaited Agenda will be published in Q1 2020. I want to thank each and every one of you that contributed your thoughts and feedback to it! We think it is a great representation of digital preservation practice since the last one [2015] came out.
Interest and Working Groups (IG/WG)
So much has been going on in this area that sometimes it is hard to keep track. The NDSA Leadership (Coordinating Committee, IG/WG chairs, DLF) meet monthly to keep each other up to date and accountable. Each IG/WG has its minutes available for others to review for past and present topics and research areas. We have also created a new group – The Communications, Outreach, and Publications Working Group that will be streamlining our actual products (like the Agenda, Levels of Preservation, survey results etc) as well as focusing on a new website structure. Our updated Storage Survey will also be coming out in Q1. Lots will be happening there in 2020.
Levels of Digital Preservation
Many of you have been involved in this work. The Levels of Preservation is an ongoing Working Group (chaired by yours truly) and will be rolling out updates on a more frequent basis. For 2020, the Curatorial Team will be finishing up its work and the new Training and Advocacy Subgroup will be all spun up. I want to thank all of you (there were almost 100 people) who participated on the various reboot teams—from across the globe! Version 2’s matrix and the associated Assessment tool is available with more resources coming soon.
New Members
One of the best parts of this work is welcoming new members. We had a banner year last year with a bumper crop of new members. Here they are!
- Clemson University
- Illinois Institute of Technology
- Roper Center for Public Opinion and Research (renewal)
- University of Miami Libraries
- University of Cincinnati Libraries
- LIBNOVA, SL
- University of Connecticut Library
- The University of Washington Libraries
- University of Louisville Libraries / William F. Ekstrom Library
- University of the Balearic Islands
- University of Colorado Boulder
We could always do more to highlight what each of you does and will work to do more of that in 2020.
DigiPres Conference
We had an amazing conference and turnout this past year in Tampa! Thanks to the entire planning team and DLF for all their hard work! 2020 will be held in Baltimore, 11-12 November. We hope to see you there. Keep an eye out for the CFP – coming soon!
If you are interested in learning more, participating in any part of the NDSA, let me know! Send an email to NDSA@diglib.org If you are not a member, please consider becoming one. The process is painless, I promise!
Wishing you all the best for 2020!
Bradley J. Daigle, Chair NDSA Leadership Team
