Abstract
Collection surveys and collecting policies have become standard for effective archival collection management. But in recent years, surveys have most often been used to establish processing and preservation priorities and collecting policies are often considered static documents that, once established, change little as the collections grow. The Yellowstone National Park Archives, with a mandate to update its collecting policy and limited space and resources, developed a project to survey its collections in order to inform an updated policy. With a more granular focus on analyzing collections than previous surveys have undertaken, this case study focused on defining success and fulfillment of some collecting areas, while also identifying areas in need of more attention. The successfully completed project has provided critical data to inform Yellowstone's collecting considerations and offers a model for other repositories in examining their collections and policies in light of a more resource-limited future.
Author Biography
Sara Pettinger is the Processing Archivist for Distinctive Collections at Purdue University in West Lafayette, Indiana. She collaborated with the Yellowstone National Park Archives as the third Archivist-in-Residence awarded by Northwest Archivists, Inc. Anne L. Foster is the Archivist for Yellowstone National Park. She earned a BA in history from Montana State University and a MLS with a concentration in archives from the University of Maryland at College Park. Foster has previously worked for academic, local history, and state government repositories in Alaska, Arizona, Colorado, and Montana.
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License.
Recommended Citation
Pettinger, Sara and Foster, Anne L.
(2024)
"Documenting Wonderland: Conducting a Collection Survey to Inform Collecting Policies,"
Journal of Western Archives: Vol. 15:
Iss.
1, Article 4.
Available at:
https://digitalcommons.usu.edu/westernarchives/vol15/iss1/4
