Grammar question

When refering to the college's archive/s is the proper term "Archives" or "Archive"?

I'm sure I'm not the only one to notice this, but I haven't done the research yet.

*edit*

A similar issue came up at the SAA Conference, or rather, the Lone Arrangers' Roundtable dinner. We discovered that we all say "The Archives is", making "archives" singular. I likened it to "Archives" as place, versus, "archive" as thing. I guess I decided, depending on if you're talking about the place or any general archive, when I refere to my archives, I use the plural/singular. But if I'm talking about an archive of any ol' stuff, it's singular.

Clear as mud?

Organizational Structure

I'm almost done with an organizational structure for the archive - at least on paper. There are a few things I need to research or make a judgement call on to decide where to put them, but I can always change my mind later. The hard part is getting the basic structure in the first place.

Then, I can start rearranging the materials themselves. After that, I go in and see if the labels on the boxes truly match the contents inside.

When I did my practicum for my MA in Public History, I arranged and described the campaign papers of a state representative whose organization system was non-existant. I think there could not have been better training than that for what I have to do now.

My way of attack was to start with big piles and then separate them into smaller piles, then those into smaller piles, and so on. That's essentially what I'm doing now. Trying to find themes or related items, grouping them together, then finding a place for them in the structure I created.

Well, truth be told, I adapted my structure from another academic's archive. Wake Forest University, to be specific. It's not radical really, it's just a reflection of how the college is structured, which goes along with the original order idea. So that's the basic idea I used. The hard part, though, is that the college kept restructuring itself. The library, for instance, was under Instruction, went to IT, and now is back under Instruction (*edit* now calling itself "Learning") . Being that I am a librarian and in charge of the archive, I decided to put the Library Services under Student Services, rather than under Instruction or IT (which are under College Department).

As long as it makes sense (and I plan on releasing my structure for opinions from my cohorts) it should suffice.

Library Exhibit

Well, our exhibit was a bigger success than I thought. Our guestbook is full of names and our mid-day programming was well attended. Our evening programming, not so much. Not counting those already involved in the exhibit, there were three the first night and four the next. Too bad, too, because the talks were very informative.

I can't say I'm sorry to see it go (tomorrow), but I did learn a lot about the logistics of setting up an event. For instance, finding a venue, marketing, recruiting people to participate, learning that if you say "Lunch & Learn" either know to provide food, or specify light refreshments served, etc. Being the extreme introvert that I am, my partner did a better job getting folks to respond than I did. However, I think I liked the program I designed more than the ones we got from marketing. I need to work on my social skills, but I am improving, if slowly.

Registration, Part II

After further use, I've discovered the user account process is different than what I wrote before (or it was changed, yet again).

It actually goes:

• Personal Info
• User Agreement
• Password (apparently it does take)
• Security Questions
• Username
• Login

They are no longer requiring students to answer the security questions before setting up their password. However, in three months or so, when they have to reset their password, will they remember what they put for answers to their questions? Maybe, but they won't remember if they capitalized it, put a space there, or added "St." to the address.

It's better than it was, but still annoying.

Being a guinea pig is not fun.

My college is one of the beta testers for a new statewide database system for our records and registration. Today is the first day for new students to register for classes. I am helping them set up their student computer accounts and then, helping them register. So, basically, two systems.

While the latter works properly, it's not helpful, and the former is just not working right.

To register, students have to set up their computer accounts, or they can't log into the computers, much less log in to register. Our IT department came up with the system and during the first year, the steps rarely followed in the proper order, but at least it wouldn't give students a useless screen. It should go: Personal info --> User agreement --> get ID/username --> Set up security questions --> Click "Done" (don't get me started on that one) --> "I forgot my password" (how can I forget something I haven't set up yet) --> Answer two of three security questions & enter password at the bottom (which few see because they have to scroll down. They just go ahead and hit enter and never bother to read the red warning text telling them they didn't enter a new password).

However, the process today seems to be

• Personal info
• User agreement
• get ID/username (once, even this failed to appear)
• Set up password (which doesn't take)
• Login page

This process is the old system, but since the password doesn't take, and the security questions are set up, the process is screwed. Now that I know that, I know to have them start over from the beginning and miraculously, they can set up their questions and then their password.

The problem with registering is that most of the classes on this campus are full and who wants to go to another campus, and reportedly it takes 20 min. for the testing results to be recognized by the registration system. Wanna bet? The first few students couldn't register for classes they'd tested into but I have had a few that could, later in the morning.

There were a few other issues, too. One person started setting up their computer account and got through most of it, but when I said to start over again, it said account not found. Moving to another computer fixed that problem. Then there was a student who was in one system but not the other. She had already set up her computer account, but it wasn't working and the username didn't look right. So, I tried looking up her computer account, but she wasn't there. Eventually she could redo the process. Then there was a student who had just set up her questions and just as quickly, forgot her answers.

I'd go on, but I've got to enter these into Footprints before the next wave. On to the afternoon!

*edited to add* And now it is 79.6 degrees in the library, down from the high of 80.2.

Well, I'll be...

Despite the short notice and, I thought, vague and not terribly interesting topic, we had ~15 people at the first NOAA talk (I didn't include the librarians).

This exhibit may not be the dud I thought we'd made it.