The Archives and Records Management program is supported by a cadre of full-time regular faculty and adjunct faculty who are leading practitioners in the field.  This program is among the small number of graduate programs in archives and records management featuring more than one regular faculty member dedicated to teaching and research in this area.  Below is a description of the principal individuals supporting the specialization.

Richard J. Cox

Richard J. Cox is Professor in Library and Information Science at the University of Pittsburgh, School of Information Sciences where he is responsible for the archives concentration in the Master's in Library Science degree and the Ph.D. degree, teaching the introductory course, courses on archival appraisal and archival access, advocacy, and ethics, and doctoral seminars on archives and recordkeeping issues. Dr. Cox is also Library and Information Science Program Chair from 2006 to 2009.  He has been a member of the Society of American Archivists Council (1986-1989), editor of the American Archivist (1991-1995), and Society of American Archivists Publications Editor (2002-2006).  Dr. Cox is presently editor of the Records & Information Management Report. He has written extensively on archival and records management topics and has published thirteen books in this area: American Archival Analysis: The Recent Development of the Archival Profession in the United States (1990) -- winner of the Waldo Gifford Leland Award given by the Society of American Archivists; Managing Institutional Archives: Foundational Principles and Practices (1992); The First Generation of Electronic Records Archivists in the United States: A Study in Professionalization (1994); Documenting Localities (1996); Closing an Era: Historical Perspectives on Modern Archives and Records Management (2000); Managing Records as Evidence and Information (2001), winner of the Waldo Gifford Leland Award in 2002; co-editor, Archives & the Public Good: Records and Accountability in Modern Society (2002); Vandals in the Stacks? A Response to Nicholson Baker’s Assault on Libraries (2002); Flowers After the Funeral: Reflections on the Post-9/11 Digital Age (2003); No Innocent Deposits: Forming Archives by Rethinking Appraisal (2004), winner of the Waldo Gifford Leland Award in 2005; Lester J. Cappon and Historical Scholarship in the Golden Age of Archival Theory (2004); and Archives and Archivists in the Information Age (2005).  A second edition of Understanding Archives and Manuscripts, co-written with James M. O’Toole, will appear in 2006, along with Ethics, Accountability, and Recordkeeping in Troubled Times.  He is presently working on books on professional education, personal recordkeeping, and a rethinking of the archival mission. Dr. Cox was elected a Fellow of the Society of American Archivists in 1989.

Karen F. Gracy is Assistant Professor at the University of Pittsburgh School of Information Sciences, where she supports the curriculum in archival studies and preservation management.  Courses for which she is responsible include digital preservation, archival representation, preservation management, and moving image archives.  She is an active member of Society of American Archivists and the Association of Moving Image Archivists; for AMIA, she has served as the chair of the Education Committee (2002-2004) and the Publications Committee (2004-2006).  She is currently the interim editor of The Moving Image, the journal of AMIA.  Her research interests include moving image archiving and preservation; preservation education; the social contexts of information creation and use, focusing on ethics and values; and, information policy, focusing on intellectual property issues. Her most recent publications include articles on preservation education for Library Resources and Technical Services (forthcoming, 2006), and "Documenting Communities of Practice:  Making the Case for Archival Ethnography," which was recently published in Archival Science.  In 2007, the Society of American Archivists will publish her first monograph:  The Imperative to Preserve:  Competing Definitions of Value in the World of Film Preservation.

Bernadette Callery presently serves the Carnegie Museum of Natural History as the Head of the Library and Archives where she has spoken on various aspects of published scientific illustration and collaborated with Lulu Lippincott, Carnegie Museum of Art, on the 2006 exhibition “Fierce Friends: Artists and Animals, 1750-1900.”  As a lecturer in the University of Pittsburgh’s Department of Library and Information Sciences, she teaches Museum Archives (2000-2006) and History of Books, Printing and Publishing (2005-2006).   She also offers a regular workshop on Museum Archives at Simmons College.  Interested in museum recordkeeping systems, particularly as those systems move from paper-based records to electronic records, she has presented papers on various aspects of museum records at meetings of MARAC, MAC, the Natural Science Collections Alliance, the Council on Botanical and Horticultural Libraries and the Society of American Archivists. Her teaching and research investigate the development of museum recordkeeping systems and archives as evidence of change in institutional policy and practice, a continuation of her dissertation research (University of Pittsburgh, 2002).  A contributor to the 2004 edition of Museum Archives: An Introduction, edited by Deborah Wythe, she was also guest editor and contributor to the 2005 issue of the Journal of Internet Cataloging which dealt with collaborative access to virtual museum collection information.  Prior to her appointment at the Carnegie Museum in 1995, she was Research Librarian at the New York Botanical Garden (1987-1994) and Librarian at the Hunt Institute for Botanical Documentation (1971-1987), where she taught, lectured and published in the areas of botanical illustration and botanical bibliography. She returned to the New York Botanical Garden in 2002 as a speaker in the Plants in Medicine, Art and Culture lecture series, celebrating the opening of the International Plant Science Center at the New York Botanical Garden. She co-curated the major exhibition “Nature’s Mirror: 200 Years of Botanical Illustration” held at the New York Public Library in 1989 and several exhibitions at the Hunt Institute, most notably “The Tradition of Fine Bookbinding in the Twentieth Century” in 1979 and co-authored the accompanying exhibition catalog. Active in the Council of Botanical and Horticultural Libraries, she received the Council’s Charles R. Long award for professional excellence in 1997.

Kate Colligan received her MLIS with a concentration in archives and records management in 1998 and CAS with an emphasis on digital preservation in 1999 from the School of Information Sciences at the University of Pittsburgh.  Kate first worked in the University Library System’s Digital Research Library, researching and implementing Encoded Archival Description (EAD) in 1998-2000 before her faculty appointment as archivist at the University of Pittsburgh’s Archives Service Center (ASC) in 2000. Her current work concentrates on access issues including supervising the processing of manuscript collections, training and supervising staff and student assistants in descriptive practice, creating EAD finding aids, and other projects that enhance the visibility of collections.  Kate has worked on a variety of projects with students involving appraisal, processing, preservation, digital projects, and EAD.  Also serving as a member of the Women’s Studies Steering Committee, Kate provides insight into the collections held by the ASC through presentations, meetings, and committee work.  Kate regularly provides lectures regarding archival issues in the introductory Preservation and Archival Representation courses as well as oversight for hands on training in Archival Representation, Preservation, and Preservation Management. Kate co-taught a new course in 2005 focusing on the applied Fieldwork aspect of the Archives and Preservation program.  This course provided a forum for students to develop professionalism and handle real world challenges.  Kate has also served as the faculty liaison for Society of American Archivists student chapter. As a member of the Society of American Archivists, Kate has served as Chair and Co-Chair of the Women’s Collections Roundtable and is the Pennsylvania Key Contact for the Membership Committee.  She is also involved in the EAD Roundtable and Description section.  Kate is an active member of the Mid-Atlantic Regional Archives Conference (MARAC) where she has provided an EAD workshop and served on program and local arrangements committees.  She is a member of the American Library Association (ALA), Rare Books and Manuscripts Section (RBMS), and the Manuscripts Society.  Kate has received funding to support the preservation and processing of the Anne X. Alpern Papers from the Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission as well as private donations and support for other projects through her collection development activities.  Kate has also been a grant reviewer for the National Historical Publications and Records Commission (NHPRC), and the Public Archives and Records Infrastructure Support (PARIS) grant program of the New Jersey Division of Archives and Records Management.  She has co-authored a research publication with Elizabeth Yakel on record keeping practices of public libraries and staff knowledge of “Right to Know Legislation”.  Kate has contributed numerous newsletter articles regarding collections, exhibits, and digital projects. 

Jean Ann Croft received her MLIS at the University of Pittsburgh and studied preservation management under the watchful eye of Sally Buchanan in 1997.  In addition, she learned bookbinding under Melissa McAfee, former Head of Preservation at the University of Pittsburgh, concentrating on conservation treatment techniques such as rebacking, recasing and protective enclosures.  Ms. Croft has sought out workshops that offered hands-on skills and attended a number of seminars at Rate Book School at the University of Virginia to learn more about preservation and the book arts.  In 1997, she became the Interim Head of Preservation in the University Library System and was appointed the permanent department head in 2000, responsible for the administrative and fiscal management of the in-house bookbinding, reformatting, and commercial binding programs.  She recently completed her MSL degree in Law focusing on Intellectual Property Rights at the University of Pittsburgh. She teaches the “Introduction to Library and Archival Preservation” course offered every fall term and the “Collections Conservation” course, team taught with Miriam Meislik.  Ms. Croft assisted Dr. Karen Gracy with her research on preservation education in the United States.  This study investigated how preservation education programs have evolved during the last decade and adapted to address the issues and challenges introduced by the digital revolution, and how these revisions have affected training in the traditional preservation techniques for books, paper, and mixed media.  Ms. Croft has investigated funding opportunities and is currently working on a number of different projects identified as possible candidates for future grant proposals.  The National Endowment for the Humanities granted the University Library System with awards to fund proposals that she had written, enabling the University Library System to preservation microfilm 2,250 books from the Bolivian Collection and currently to microfilm and digitize materials from the Chinese collection.  Furthermore, she has submitted a review article on the literature of preservation published between 1999 and 2001 to Library Resources and Technical Services, which was published in the April 2003 issue.  Her work with the Oakland Library Consortium and Pittsburgh Bibliophiles has provided substantial experience and a solid background in organizing seminars, speakers, and workshops for the Pittsburgh region.  She has participated behind the scenes as an organizer and speaker or instructor for these kinds of programs.

Miriam Meislik currently holds two appointments within the University of Pittsburgh.  Her primary appointment is as Archivist/Photograph Curator in charge of media collections for the Archives Service Center.  Her second appointment is as Adjunct Lecturer in the School of Information Science where she lectures on media preservation issues and co-instructs in LIS 2216 Collections Conservation on issues of photographic and media preservation and conservation strategies. Her research interests include digitization of non-paper formats, metadata of digitized non-paper formats, and collection management.  Other teaching experience includes courses on preserving family collections in the Continuing Education Program, now the Center for Lifetime Learning as well as lectures for Library and Archival Preservation, Moving Image and Sound Archives, Digital Preservation among other courses offered by the University.  She also instructs and mentors students interested in photographic and media archiving.  Her professional activities include Photograph Editor for the Society of American Archivists Archival Fundamentals Series, Past Chair of the Visual Materials Section of the Society of American Archivists, and newly appointed member of the Society of American Archivists recently formed Ad Hoc Advisory Group to promote and create educational opportunities for Photographic and Visual Arts. Miriam is also active in the Association of Moving Image Archivists. Miriam is a graduate of Edinboro University of Pennsylvania and the University of Pittsburgh where she received her MLS in Library Science with a focus on Archives and Records Management.  Along with her work in the university, she has also worked in local government records management and archives, museum archives, and as a head librarian and library cataloguer.  Her conference presentations include discussions of the issues of photographic preservation, photographic digitization, and media collection management, as well as presenting to local genealogical groups on preserving family photographs and documents. 

Dr. Koshman teaches graduate courses in information technology with a focus on digital information management for archives, information architecture, and information visualization. Her primary research interests include investigating user interaction with information visualization systems, web information retrieval and search analysis, and visualization interface development.  Her research has appeared in leading research journals such as the Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, Journal of Web Engineering, Journal of Documentation, and Information Processing & Management, and in conferences such as the Human Computer Interaction International Conference, the American Society for Information Science and Technology, the Information Architecture Summit, and the Canadian Association for Information Science. Dr. Koshman has recently been awarded the Innovation in Education Award by the Provost’s Advisory Council on Instructional Excellence and a research grant by the Office of Research and University Research Council.