Practicum Log #20: Accessioning and Deaccessioning

I worked on moving archival boxes back to their shelves in this collection room for most of the shift again today. We finished all of the pallets and began organizing all of the files by box number onto their rightful place.

Tuesday, July 2, 2024 from 1:00-5:00 PM

Southwestern University is the oldest university in Texas (founded in 1840), and yet it has always been a very small university with about 1600 students in total. The university keeps it intentionally small as part of its educational philosophy and wanting to retain a small student to faculty ratio. Because of this unique history, Southwestern’s distinctive collections is massive for a university this size. The archivist at Southwestern has an interesting responsibility to maintain the collections of Texas politicians, Texas politicians’ relatives, the archives for Alpha Chi (the national honor society - founded at Southwestern University), Southwestern’s own archives for departments and faculty, and collections from Georgetown and Williamson County. As I spent another shift helping out in Distinctive Collections, I talked to Megan about how she acquired all of the items.

I learned that in archives, the term for acquiring materials is called accessioning, and the term for weeding the collection is called deaccessioning. I asked her how they organized a collection when they get it and what they do with collections they no longer need or use. She said that when they accession a collection, they look at how it is organized by the donor first. Oftentimes, the donor has organized everything in a way that makes sense, and the archivists try to honor that organization. If they accession an unorganized collection, they spend time getting familiar with the collection, and go through a process that Megan calls, “letting the collection talk to us.” She says that a pattern of organization always emerges.

Full Schedule: l will be working 10:00-2:00 from May 28th to June 7th, M-F online. (The campus is undergoing some construction and all of the librarians are working from home.) Then, from June 10 - July 19th, I will be working 1:00-5:00 on campus at Southwestern University. I will more than likely finish by July 12th, but I'm adding a week for wiggle room. This should lead to 128 hours.