SPEC Kit 347: Community-based Collections · 51
offices. Whereas, with the collection in Newport, RI, the artifacts were rarely seen or visited because of the constraints
of security for the church. This is a much better situation. Two to four people were instrumental in moving the artifacts
to Lawrence, RI. Others did investigative work, such as looking into... how many objects there were and where would
everything fit, what would be a central location where many people would benefit, what would be the most secure
option for the artifacts, physically, environmentally, and with regard to theft? Now the New England United Methodist
Historical Society and New England Conference Commission on Archives are collaborating on looking into additional
funds and resources for off-site storage needs, historic preservation aid to a few churches in New Hampshire and Maine,
and other projects as they are brought up to the committees.
Significant projects developed by community members include several exhibits and publications. Community members
also help populate a public biographical database.
Some artists volunteer by providing metadata or other descriptive information about their collections, or by visiting to
teach students directly about their archives and their artistic creations and experiences.
Volunteers have helped with some scanning work. In addition, teams of volunteers contributed to an exhibit and event
that featured the collection. They helped with food, ushering, event setup, singing.
We have some of our volunteers, who created the collections, with us for over 30 years.
34. Are there opportunities for non-community members to volunteer with the collection? N=36
Yes, in person 10 28%
Yes, virtually (i.e., crowd sourced web information) 7 19%
No 23 64%
Comments N=9
History Department internship for credit
I think if we made more information about the organization and collection known, more people would be willing to help
out. It is difficult for volunteers to work with the records collections because we are centrally located in the middle of
Boston, MA. Many of those that would be of an age or interest level to volunteer are not able to easily access the city. It
is unfortunate, but something that can be rectified thanks to the resources allocated to students that have work-study
money. Little cost comes from the two organizations’ funds for staffing because I strive to hire work-study students
whose scholarship money is subsidized by the government. All they need to do is come and work for me to earn
that money.
The collection hosts occasional student interns or volunteers, as needed.
The Pan Am Flight 103 Archives has occasionally provided internship opportunities to graduate students from Syracuse
University’s library science and museum studies departments. These students have assisted Archives staff in mounting
exhibits, processing collections, and generating EAD finding aids.
Two archives volunteers
We are in the preliminary stages of planning a crowdsourcing (translation) project for a digitized manuscript collection
related to this community.
We are not currently able to accommodate volunteers due to lack of space and supervisory resources. (2 responses)
We generally do not have volunteers in Special Collections.
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