Virtual Deinstallation During the COVID-19 Pandemic

The U.S. National Archives and Records Administration's Electronic Records Archives (ERA), built to hold the avalanche of electronic records being created by the federal government of the United States, recently reached a major milestone. On September 30, 2011 ERA's initial development phase ended and the operations and maintenance phase began. Begun in 2005, ERA incrementally deployed important functions starting in 2008, when the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) started ingesting its existing collection of electronic records into ERA and piloting the records management functions that allow federal agencies to create records schedules and transfer their permanent electronic records to NARA.As of January 30, 2012 ERA was storing more than 131 terabytes of records in a wide variety of formats from the United States Congress, federal Agencies, and the George W. Bush White House. This volume is just the beginning of what ERA will manage and store, though. For example, NARA has recently received around 300 terabytes of electronic records from the 2010 Census, currently being prepared for ingest into ERA. NARA is relying on ERA every day to perform a key part of its basic mission, and ERA provides a flexible foundation on which NARA can build increasingly sophisticated functions over time.ERA's successes are critical to the mission of the archives, but the challenges the project encountered and the lessons NARA learned along the way may be more valuable to the digital preservation community. This paper will provide a summary of what ERA is and highlights of the project's accomplishments, but will also discuss important decision points in planning and development, external constraints, lessons learned from the experience, and challenges remaining in the future. Lessons learned include the importance of project governance, strategies for maintaining control of the project, and the necessity of constantly communicating to ensure that stakeholder expectations are realistic. Challenges included managing a large number of disparate requirements for records governed under different legal frameworks and working under the constraints of legally mandated timeframes for records ingest and access. NARA's response to these challenges involved a solution architecture that includes a common architectural pattern shared by different instances within a system of systems. NARA will be relying on this flexible software framework, along with standardized interfaces and data elements, to adapt ERA now that the system has moved out of initial development and into the operations and maintenance phase.

In 2011, the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) in the USA faced worldwide attention when it was revealed that thousands of documents had been stolen from its collection, including rare Civil War documents and presidential papers. The response by NARA was to create a Holdings Protection Team, with the task of overseeing and managing the collection security at NARA's multiple locations across the United States. In this paper NARA's strategy for collection security management (CSM) is placed alongside current research into CSM in libraries and archives to demonstrate how NARA exhibits a ‘house’ model of collection security, as seen through their slogan ‘Protect Our House’. From this discussion, some lessons for Australia are explored, with calls for some specific CSM guidelines from Australia's professional bodies in the information sector, such as the Australian Library and Information Association (ALIA).

On 14 July 2017, the U.S. National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) announced that it would shorten the time period for holding eleven kinds of noncitizen detainee records and invited public comment on these changes. NARA stated that the decision to recategorize many of these records as “temporary” was because they held “little or no research value.” The files included records of abuse, assault, and deaths of people in immigration detention. Curious how NARA valued research, we designed a project asking what could be learned—about abuse in detention and NARA—from these documents. This article describes our methodological approach and our findings and discusses the implications of both for future research on immigration, government archiving practices, and accountability. We submitted Freedom of Information Act requests for the eleven document types slated for earlier disposal and analyzed Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s documentation of neglect and abuse in immigration detention. To do so, we traced the documents’ intertextuality, showing how each document relied on—and further produced—other documents. Challenging NARA’s calculative logics, we show that disposing of these documents would widen gaps, holes, and silences in an already partial, state-centric archive, limiting which future histories of U.S. immigration policies might be told.

The nation's memory the United States National Archives and Records Administration An Interview with Don W. Wilson, archivist of the United States, National Archives and Records Administration, Washington, DC 20408, USA

The National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) has published several books that can be used by the genealogist to locate additional research material. This bibliography does not include the pamphlets or brochures that NARA produces and gives to beginning genealogists. It does include all the major NARA publications. It is divided into three sections: a review of the general guide (the basic source guide to NARA holdings, published in 1983); a discussion of catalogs of microfilmed records, which contain descriptions and roll lists of microfilmed publications by subject, and a review of NARA's two ethnic subject guides (a comprehensive guide to records relating to Native Americans and a guide to civilian records relating to Afro‐Americans).

Inflation (1943) and the Blacklist: The Disrupted Film Career of Cy Endfield

Track: Track 2: Interaction Better understanding of the relevance to ASIST members of the relationships among archives, knowledge management, libraries, and records management within organizations Proposals for collaborative activity between SIG MGT, SIG KM, and the Information Professional Task Force examining these relationships Topic: This session will explore the common and differential responsibilities among the functions of archives, knowledge management, library management, and records management, as represented by their professional organizations. These professions are often perceived to have distinct responsibilities: libraries for published information, records management for proprietary information, archives for “the non-current records of individuals, groups, institutions, and governments that contain information of enduring value” (using an SAA definition), and knowledge management in its tacit and explicit forms. From this viewpoint, libraries, records management, and archives' responsibilities are not overlapping, and are instead mutually exclusive. Moreover, it suggests that knowledge management supports these activities and even supplies information support not provided by libraries, records management, or archives. The session will examine how representatives of these information functions define them and how these conceptualizations can be applied, both separately and in collaboration with one another, so as to enhance research and practice. How should archives, knowledge management, librarianship, and the management of records be differentially defined? Why does this matter to researchers, to information professionals, or to managers? In light of this, how can SIG MGT, SIG KM, and the Information Professional Task Force coordinate their activities better? Description (180 minutes) This panel session will be moderated by Dr. Bill Edgar, the current chairperson of SIG MGT. The speakers will include guests from the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA), the Association of Records Managers and Administrators (ARMA), the Society of American Archivists (SAA), the Special Libraries Association (from a corporate library), as well as a researcher in knowledge management drawn from ASIST SIG KM membership. Their comments will be synthesized Dr. Julian Warner, a member of SIG HFIS. The speakers will address the Discussion Questions from their own viewpoint as well as that of their professional or scholarly society. Though SIG MGT has been inactive in recent years, it has the potential to be a forum for information professionals and researchers to discuss complex questions spanning multiple information professions and organizational environments. This session has the potential to revive interest in SIG MGT; it also provides an opportunity for ASIST members to advance the agenda of the ASIST Information Professionals Task Force across the information professions. The session will occur across two blocks, each block lasting 90 minutes, with the two separated by a coffee break. During the first 90 minutes, each speaker will discuss his or her thoughts on the Discussion Questions for approximately 12 minutes, ending with Dr. Warner's remarks. The second 90 minutes will be led by Dr. Sandy Hirsh, the current chairperson of the Information Professional Task Force. For the first 60 minutes attendees will split into groups to discuss the speakers' remarks, with the speakers and Dr. Hirsh rotating around the groups to facilitate discussions. Then Dr. Hirsh will lead a session-wide discussion for the final 30 minutes reviewing and integrating attendees comments. Moderator: Dr. Bill Edgar, Missouri State University [ASIST, SIG MGT] Speakers: Mr. Paul M. Wester, Jr., National Archives and Records Administration Mr. Peter Chiomenti, General Conference of Seventh Day Adventists. [ARMA, SAA] Mr. Chad Doran, Applied Physics Lab, John Hopkins University [ARMA] Dr. Sandra Hirsh, San Jose State University, [ASIST Information Professional Task Force] Dr. Julian Warner, Queen's University Belfast [ASIST SIG HFIS] Dr. Heather Day Pfeiffer, New Mexico State University [ASIST SIG KM] Ms. Deanna Hall, President, Corporate Information Resources, Inc.

This article focuses on use and users of data from the NARA (National Archives and Records Administration), U.S. Who is using archival electronic records, and why are they using them? It describes the changes in use and consequently user groups over the last 30 years. The changes in use are related to the evolution of reference services for electronic records at NARA, as well as to growth in the types of electronic records accessioned by NARA. The first user group consisted mainly of researchers with a social science background, who usually expected to handle the data themselves. The user community expanded when electronic records with personal value, like casualty records, were transferred to NARA, and broadened yet again when a selection of NARA’s electronic records became available online. Archivists trying to develop user services for electronic records will find that the needs and expectations of fact or information seeking data users are different from those of researchers using and analyzing data files.

SUMMARY The National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) launched the Archival Research Catalog (ARC) in 2002. ARC was the first centralized system for describing materials held throughout NARA's nationwide system of archival repositories. ARC's complicated development involved the entire agency, as staff wrestled with years of distinct descriptive practices. NARA evaluated external and internal standards, established a consensus-based decision-making structure, and through teamwork, successfully put into practice shared data structure, data content, and data value standards. This article addresses the selection or creation, implementation, and maintenance of the authority files and thesauri that provide data values for ARC access points to ensure consistent and precise retrieval of archival descriptions.

By the authority vested in me as by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, and in to establish policies and procedures governing the assertion of executive by incumbent and former Presidents in connection with the release of by the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) pursuant to the Records of 1978, it is hereby ordered as follows: Section 1. Definitions. For purposes of this order: (a) refers to the Archivist of the United States or his designee. (b) refers to the National Archives and Records Administration. (c) Presidential Records Act refers to the Records Act, 44 U.S.C. 2201-2207. (d) refers to the NARA regulations implementing the Records Act, 36 C.F.R. Part 1270. (e) Presidential records refers to those documentary materials maintained by NARA pursuant to the Records Act, including Vice records. (f) Former President refers to the former during whose term or terms of office particular were created. (g) A question of executive privilege exists if NARA's disclosure of might impair national security (including the conduct of foreign relations), law enforcement, or the deliberative processes of the executive branch. (h) A final court order is a court from which no appeal may be taken. Sec. 2. Notice of Intent to Disclose Records. (a) When the Archivist provides notice to the incumbent and former Presidents of his intent to disclose pursuant to section 1270.46 of the NARA regulations, the Archivist, using any guidelines provided by the incumbent and former Presidents, shall identify any specific materials, the disclosure of which he believes may raise a substantial question of executive privilege. However, nothing in this is intended to affect the right of the incumbent or former Presidents to invoke executive with respect to materials not identified by the Archivist. Copies of the notice for the incumbent shall be delivered to the (through the Counsel to the President) and the Attorney General (through the Assistant Attorney General for the Office of Legal Counsel). The copy of the notice for the former shall be delivered to the former or his designated representative. (b) Upon the passage of 30 days after receipt by the incumbent and former Presidents of a notice of intent to disclose records, the Archivist may disclose the covered by the notice, unless during that time period the Archivist has received a claim of executive by the incumbent or former or the Archivist has been instructed by the incumbent or his designee to extend the time period for a time certain and with reason for the extension of time provided in the notice. If a shorter period of time is required under the circumstances set forth in section 1270.44 of the NARA regulations, the Archivist shall so indicate in the notice. Sec. 3. Claim of Executive Privilege by Incumbent President. (a) Upon receipt of a notice of intent to disclose records, the Attorney General (directly or through the Assistant Attorney General for the Office of Legal Counsel) and the Counsel to the shall review as they deem appropriate the covered by the notice and consult with each other, the Archivist, and such other executive agencies as they deem appropriate concerning whether invocation of executive is justified. …

InterPARES: Securing the Future of Our Electronic Records

The National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) is responsible for preserving historically valuable records of the U.S. Government. In the digital realm, that encompasses an exponentially growing volume of electronic record in a great variety of increasingly complex formats. To address this challenge, NARA is developing the Electronic Records Archives system [1].

The US National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) issued its ‘Strategic Directions for Federal Records Management’ in 2002 in response to the changing demands of managing records in the electronic environment and within the context of the requirements of the 2002 Electronic Government Act. To address these new challenges, and having identified the barriers to federal agencies managing their records effectively, NARA is working with the agencies in three specific areas: (1) advocacy and communication, (2) policy and guidance and (3) implementation and assurance. Within these areas NARA is (1) working to communicate the ‘right message to the right people’ and has introduced new training programmes aimed at different groups of RM stakeholders; (2) has revised or issued new guidance and regulations, especially for e-records management, in partnership with stakeholder groups and (3) through pilot projects, has developed new tools to help implementation and ensure accountability.

The history of the U.S. National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) becoming a digital agency is the history of NARA going from an inward-focused agency to an agency that is opening up to collaborate with others and using new technologies to do so. When the Archivist of the United States, David Ferriero, came to lead the agency in 2009, he said that for many users, “if it isn’t online, it doesn’t exist.” He moved the agency out of its twentieth century model of access and led it into a new era of digital access, which it continues to pursue today. At the beginning of 2009, NARA had one blog, a catalogue with relatively few digital copies available, and no innovation goals. Today, NARA boasts 150 projects on over a dozen platforms, a social catalogue with over 17 million digital copies, and the agency’s first Innovation Hub.

Documenting federal scientific and technical information (STI): A discussion of appraisal criteria and applications for the national archives and records administration