West Chester University Financial Aid : Federal Work Study

Library - Special Collections

Holds and preserves the library’s unique and rare items and collections. Special Collections not only holds these items but is responsible for making these items accessible and usable for all stakeholders. These truly are some of the treasures of WCU.

Physical Address:

FHG Library Room #615

Website:

https://library.wcupa.edu/home

Community Service:

On/Off Campus:

On-Campus

Student Assistant (Pay Band 2)

Supervisor Contact Information

Emily Bergen
(610) 436-2403
ebergen@wcupa.edu

Tara Wink
(610) 436-3456
twink@wcupa.edu

Position Responsibilities:: Data Input, General Office, Library, Social Media
Involves the following:: • Confidential or sensitive data/information
This position will provide general assistance with:: The daily operations of Special Collections, including but not limited to reshelving books, creating content and container listings for collections, helping to create, research and install Special Collections and Library exhibits, doing special collections research (i.e. finding materials and creating basic write-ups) for reference requests, etc.
Specific duties as they relate to this department:: Special Collections does contain unique and rare materials. This means students will be working with expensive, valuable and extremely unique items. They need proper training on the care and handling of these items as well as additional training on the processing, organization, scanning and description of these materials. Students also need to be trusted around these items. Students will be trained on archival processing standards found in Describing Archives a Content Standard (DACS), ARCHON finding aid software, as well as digital hardware (EPSON scanner) and software (Photoshop).
Learning Outcomes:: Depending on the students aspirations this experience can have more or less impact on their career. For example, a history student or a student interested in Museum, Library or Archival work will get first-hand experience with this type of work in Special Collections. Other students are simply learning the responsibility to show up on time and do work that will effect future researchers. The work that students do in Special Collections will remain beyond their tenure at WCU and it needs make the collections more accessible and usable over the long term. In additions students inevitably will gain an understanding and hopefully an appreciation for the long history of WCU and will hopefully understand the impact of archives and Special Collections on institutional memory.