Job Posting: Digital Collections Curator, The Pennsylvania State University Libraries

The Pennsylvania State University Libraries seeks a Digital Collections Curator to play a key role in the further development of our electronic content stewardship and publishing programs. These programs will be developed through a strategic and dynamic partnership between the Penn State Libraries and Information Technology Services (ITS). The Digital Collections Curator will lead the Libraries’ efforts to develop and plan user focused services that enable the effective creation, sharing, discovery, and use of digital content in support of research, teaching and learning. The Digital Collections Curator collaborates extensively with colleagues throughout the Libraries and ITS to achieve his or her objectives. The Curator will report to the Assistant Dean for Scholarly Communications who also oversees Digitization and Preservation, Scholarly Communications Services, and the Office of Digital Scholarly Publishing. This is a tenure track appointment.
Responsibilities will include:

  • Lead development of an inclusive, user-focused agenda for digital scholarly content stewardship.
  • Investigate, recommend, and develop plans for user-focused and repository- based services to effectively manage the sustainable creation, collection and distribution of high-value digital scholarly content.
  • Manage a broad set of existing digital collections and repository content, including: reformatted materials (images, books, newspapers, manuscripts, etc), publication related content (journals, conference proceedings, monographs, hybrid formats, post & pre-prints, working papers, etc), as well as the potential and emerging needs for data collections in a wide array of disciplines.
  • Research and develop in-depth knowledge of new and emerging technologies, relevant national standards, and best practices, in order to assess and promote their integration into local operations as appropriate.
  • Serve on standing working groups and committees related to web functionality and digital content creation and management.
  • Communicate effectively with internal stakeholders in the areas of collections & public services, technical services, information technologies, and scholarly communications.
  • Promote and report on Penn State’s activities through conference and workshop presentations, written publications
  • Represent Penn State in relevant professional contexts and engage with national and consortial peers to identify and/or carry out mutually beneficial partnerships.

Requirements:

  • Master’s degree in library and/or information science, or advanced degree in relevant academic field.
  • Should have 3 years work related to the creation, management, and provision of electronic data resources in a higher education environment.
  • Should demonstrate strong organizational and/or process management abilities.
  • Should demonstrate familiarity with developing trends in higher education information management, including, but not limited to: Cyberinfrastructure development, data curation and preservation, electronic publishing, digital scholarship and non-traditional scholarly communications
  • Ability to lead and work collaboratively in an evolving and decentralized environment.
  • Commitment to user focused design, development, and service provision.
  • Communication skills that will support work with both technology experts and novices.
  • Facility with common standards and practices in contemporary digital library management. Experience with XSLT, Perl or other scripting languages, and/or experience with major repository platforms is desirable.

Environment:
As an outcome of joint strategic planning, the Penn State Libraries and Information Technology Services (ITS) are collaborating in the development of this Content Stewardship program to meet extant and emerging digital content and asset management needs in areas such as digital library collections, scholarly communications, electronic record archiving, and e-science/e-research. Building on existing services and infrastructure, this program will put in place a cohesive and extensible suite of data access, management, and preservation services that will support the creation and distribution of digital scholarship. Additionally, the Penn State Press and the Libraries jointly operate the Office of Digital Scholarly Publishing to explore and incubate publishing services that support the Penn State community.
Penn State, a land-grant institution, is a member of the CIC (Big 10) academic consortium. The Penn State University Libraries currently rank 8th in North America among private and public research universities, based on Association for Research Libraries Investment Index. The Libraries hold membership in ARL, OCLC, CRL and the Digital Library Federation. Collections exceed 6.5 million volumes, including more than 68,000 current serial subscriptions.
The University Libraries are located at University Park and 23 other campuses throughout Pennsylvania, with approximately 6,000 faculty and 42,000 students at University Park, and more than 82,000 students system wide. The University Park campus is set in the State College metropolitan area, a university town located in the heart of central Pennsylvania. State College offers a vibrant community with outstanding recreational facilities, a low crime rate, and excellent public schools. The campus is within a half-day drive to Washington, DC, Baltimore, Philadelphia, New York City and Pittsburgh. For more information, please visit http://www.libraries.psu.edu and http://www.cbicc.org/
Application Instructions:
Send a letter of application, resume, and the names and contact information of three references to Search Committee, The Pennsylvania State University, Box DCC-PSUA, 511 Paterno Library, University Park, PA 16802, via email to lhrsearches@psulias.psu.edu, or fax to 814-863-5592. Review of applications will begin March 2, 2009 and continue until the position is filled.
Penn State is committed to affirmative action, equal opportunity, and the diversity of its workforce.