Access to North Carolina’s Special Collections
Vision, Principles, and Strategic Directions
Our Vision
All of North Carolina's
cultural institutions work together to make the state's unique cultural and historical
resources accessible for the education and enjoyment of people of all ages in
the state, nation, and the world.
Our Values and
Guiding Principles
1.
Cultural
institutions* support the democratic ideal of an informed, educated citizenry.
2.
Source
documents, works of art, and museum artifacts enhance education and the quality
of life for everyone.
3.
Cultural
institutions seek to be inclusive, providing accessibility to their resources
for all ages, while providing a voice for the diverse populations in the state.
4.
Cultural
institutions are continually growing and evolving, increasing the awareness of
their rich resources and building new communities of users.
5.
Cultural
institutions use the appropriate technologies to create new ways to extend access
and to preserve the state’s cultural resources for current and future
generations.
6.
Cultural
institutions add value to the resources in their collections by providing
context to their materials, allowing individual users to better interpret for
themselves the resources being presented.
7.
Cooperation
among cultural institutions allows each individual institution to determine the
extent of their participation, respects the cultures of the different types of
institutions, and recognizes that every institution has something to
contribute.
8.
Cooperation
among cultural institutions involves working together in a focused way to
share, as well as leverage, resources, strengthening the efforts of individual
institutions and building greater connections between holdings, thereby
enhancing their overall use.
9.
Professionals
in cultural institutions act responsibly and ethically and are objective in
their provision of access and content. They are dedicated to achieving results,
while being realistic about opportunities and challenges.
Strategic Directions
I. Discovery
Strategies
in this area will assess the extent of the collections and resources of the
state’s cultural institutions, the current status of their preservation and
access, and their needs and priorities while building an inter-institutional
community.
1.
Identify and survey North Carolina's
cultural repositories regarding holdings, staffing, collection use, etc.
2.
Hold survey summary meetings and create
other information sharing devices to inform those being surveyed regarding
survey results, while allowing cultural caretakers to begin strengthening ties
between different types of cultural institutions.
3.
Begin to identify key collections that
might be targets for resource support, especially those that could be
components in collaborative projects.
II. Access
Strategies
in this area will improve access to the resources held by North Carolina’s
cultural institutions, with an emphasis on using new digital technologies and
the Internet.
1.
Develop tools to make it easy for people
to discover and use those resources, with an emphasis on those using new
technologies.
2.
Develop and promote techniques and tools
that are appropriate for the cultural materials of the different communities of
interest.
3.
Provide appropriate contextual
information for primary source materials (objects, art, and records) so users
might better interpret and understand their cultural resources.
III. Skills and Knowledge
Strategies in this area will
equip cultural caretakers with the skills and information they need to collect,
preserve, and provide access to the cultural resources of North Carolina.
1. Use the
World Wide Web and other online tools to inform and educate cultural
caretakers.
2. Establish
guidelines for acceptable practice and communicate them to the cultural
community.
3. Use the
survey process as an opportunity for teaching and learning.
4. Provide
formal continuing education to increase skills and knowledge in the cultural
community while generating a commitment to best practices.
IV. Preservation
Strategies in this area will
help cultural institutions maintain the resources entrusted to them, as well as
the media created to provide greater access to those originals.
1.
Bring
cultural caretakers together to identify opportunities for strengthening
current preservation programs.
2.
Identify
best practices for preserving what has been duplicated in a digital format.
V. Celebrate and
Communicate
Strategies in this area will
inform members of the cultural repository community, the general public, and
the funding agencies of activities that are creating greater access to cultural
materials, while drawing attention to the challenges faced by the partner
institutions and celebrating their resources and the commitment of their custodians.
1. Develop
and implement a formal communications plan to inform potential partners, the
general public and representatives of funding agencies about plans and
activities.
2. Engage
current and potential partners in “continuing conversations” about needs,
issues, and plans to assure a responsive program that has broad support.
3.
Remain
open to exploring connections/collaborations with other states and
organizations attempting similar programs.
4.
Celebrate
the resources and people who maintain them that we discover during the process.
5.
Promote
the work of cultural institutions.
* Any cultural institution (library, archive, museum, historic site, or organization), which maintains a permanent, non-living collection of unique materials held for research and/or exhibit purposes and open for the use of the public. Denominational/associational collections are included, but individual church collections are not. Art museums are included but galleries are not. Zoos, arboreta, and parks are not included unless, as a part of their mission, they hold collections described above.