ICPSR Digital Preservation Internship

This summer I worked as a Digital Preservation Assistant at the Inter-University Consortium for Political and Social Research (ICPSR, part of the Institute for Social Research). I worked with Nancy McGovern, Preservation Officer at ICPSR. I researched geospatial data digital preservation, focusing on best practices, history and milestones, and policies currently in place. From this research, I developed recommendations for ICPSR in regards to their collections in geospatial data. Actually, I’m not done with this project yet, but it turned into a fall job so I will keep working on it. I also am creating glossary and resource entries for a new digital preservation web site. Besides geospatial data, I researched and evaluated current trends in persistent identifiers, different definitions of digital preservation, and user markup language. I’m also working on editing the Digital Preservation Tutorial.

I found my internship through taking the course 581, Preserving Information. For my needs assessment survey, I chose the ICPSR. Nancy remembered me from my project and invited me to apply for the internship. So you never know when a course assignment will turn into something that pays! Also, the job was posted on iTrack.

If you are a first year student interested in digital preservation and preservation planning in general, an internship at ICPSR might be a great fit. Feel free to contact me about my experience.