Citi Center for Culture + Queens Public Library Fellowship Fall 2023 / Spring 2024
The Citi Center for Culture and Queens Public Library would like to extend an invitation to apply for a two-semester fellowship taking place during Fall 2023 and Spring 2024. Applicants must be currently enrolled students in the Graduate School of Library and Information Studies who are committed to earning the Certificate in Archives and the Preservation of Cultural Material and/or those participating in the MLS/MA in History Dual Degree program. Fellows will each receive a $2000 scholarship from the Citi Center for Culture at the conclusion of the fellowship in the summer of 2024.
To enhance the professional prospects of our Fellows, we have developed a program that provides them the opportunity to diversify their exposure to collection management and use of archival collections. The Fellowship consists of semester-long rotations at each of our two institutions. We believe that the diversity of scope, mission, and collections managed by our respective institutions will serve to broaden the skills and enhance the profile of the students we select to participate:
• Citi Center for Culture, 388 Greenwich St., NY, NY, which manages Citigroup’s corporate archives and the company’s fine art collection. The Center provides a unique insight into the business value of historic materials. Students will process a collection of papers, will be exposed to how the collection is used and challenges presented by scale in a global financial services corporation.
• Queens Public Library, 89-11 Merrick Blvd., Jamaica, NY, is headquarters of Queens Memory, a community archiving program founded in 2010. Queens Memory collects oral histories and visual records from Queens residents for the library’s digital archives collections. Fellows will also interact with the staff and collections of the Archives at Queens Public Library, one of the largest collections of primary and secondary resources documenting Queens, Kings, Nassau and Suffolk counties. It consists of approximately 36,000 books and volumes of serials, approximately 2,500 cubic feet of manuscripts, 4,500 maps and broadsides, 105,000 photographs, 422 feet of vertical files, and 9,000 reels of microfilm. The bulk of the printed material and manuscripts are from the 19th and 20th centuries, but extensive 18th century material and some 17th century manuscripts are also held.
As a result, we are confident that students will gain meaningful first-hand experience in corporate and public library archives settings; and be more marketable when seeking future career opportunities. Specifically, the students enrolled in the program will gain direct experience in:
Citi Center for Culture:
• Archival collection processing:
- Conducting a survey
- Producing a processing plan
- Arranging and describing records
• Writing a scope and content note for a finding aid
• Metadata creation and TMS cataloging
• Discussions that include topics such as:
- Mission, scope and funding model of corporate archives
- Providing access to collections
- Use of the collection and collecting metrics
- Challenges and constraints
Queens Public Library:
• Born-digital image and audio collection processing, including audio editing and transcriptions
• Contributing to metadata creation and normalization for cataloging archival objects
• Creation of curated collections of historic images and/or oral histories on the library’s Urban Archive (map-
based) or Aviary platforms
• Creation of an oral history interview from planning to processing
• Archival processing for oral history recordings
• Web archiving
• Social media research and creation of scheduled posts
A maximum of two fellows will be accepted for this two-semester appointment. They will work for a full semester at each site (pending pandemic reopening considerations). Site staff will work closely with fellows to introduce them to a wide variety of processes, materials and systems on-site. Fellows will be expected to commit to a regular weekly schedule during both semesters of their fellowship. Accepted fellows may enroll in the LBSCI 795 Internship course during their semester working with archives staff at the Citi Center for Culture. They will fulfill all of the regular requirements of the internship course. In the alternate semester, dual degree students may be eligible to enroll in an Internship course (HIST 787) to complete their semester with Queens Public Library. If a candidate is interested in HIST 787, a faculty advisor can assist with available options. If accepted Fellows prefer to not enroll in HIST 787 or LBSCI 795, they must still meet the hourly requirements of the fellowship to ensure an equal experience for everyone in the program.
Applications are due March 6th. Qualified candidates will be invited for an online interview between March 14th-17th and all applicants will be notified of selections by March 21st. An online orientation meeting for accepted fellows will take place May 15th.
To enhance the professional prospects of our Fellows, we have developed a program that provides them the opportunity to diversify their exposure to collection management and use of archival collections. The Fellowship consists of semester-long rotations at each of our two institutions. We believe that the diversity of scope, mission, and collections managed by our respective institutions will serve to broaden the skills and enhance the profile of the students we select to participate:
• Citi Center for Culture, 388 Greenwich St., NY, NY, which manages Citigroup’s corporate archives and the company’s fine art collection. The Center provides a unique insight into the business value of historic materials. Students will process a collection of papers, will be exposed to how the collection is used and challenges presented by scale in a global financial services corporation.
• Queens Public Library, 89-11 Merrick Blvd., Jamaica, NY, is headquarters of Queens Memory, a community archiving program founded in 2010. Queens Memory collects oral histories and visual records from Queens residents for the library’s digital archives collections. Fellows will also interact with the staff and collections of the Archives at Queens Public Library, one of the largest collections of primary and secondary resources documenting Queens, Kings, Nassau and Suffolk counties. It consists of approximately 36,000 books and volumes of serials, approximately 2,500 cubic feet of manuscripts, 4,500 maps and broadsides, 105,000 photographs, 422 feet of vertical files, and 9,000 reels of microfilm. The bulk of the printed material and manuscripts are from the 19th and 20th centuries, but extensive 18th century material and some 17th century manuscripts are also held.
As a result, we are confident that students will gain meaningful first-hand experience in corporate and public library archives settings; and be more marketable when seeking future career opportunities. Specifically, the students enrolled in the program will gain direct experience in:
Citi Center for Culture:
• Archival collection processing:
- Conducting a survey
- Producing a processing plan
- Arranging and describing records
• Writing a scope and content note for a finding aid
• Metadata creation and TMS cataloging
• Discussions that include topics such as:
- Mission, scope and funding model of corporate archives
- Providing access to collections
- Use of the collection and collecting metrics
- Challenges and constraints
Queens Public Library:
• Born-digital image and audio collection processing, including audio editing and transcriptions
• Contributing to metadata creation and normalization for cataloging archival objects
• Creation of curated collections of historic images and/or oral histories on the library’s Urban Archive (map-
based) or Aviary platforms
• Creation of an oral history interview from planning to processing
• Archival processing for oral history recordings
• Web archiving
• Social media research and creation of scheduled posts
A maximum of two fellows will be accepted for this two-semester appointment. They will work for a full semester at each site (pending pandemic reopening considerations). Site staff will work closely with fellows to introduce them to a wide variety of processes, materials and systems on-site. Fellows will be expected to commit to a regular weekly schedule during both semesters of their fellowship. Accepted fellows may enroll in the LBSCI 795 Internship course during their semester working with archives staff at the Citi Center for Culture. They will fulfill all of the regular requirements of the internship course. In the alternate semester, dual degree students may be eligible to enroll in an Internship course (HIST 787) to complete their semester with Queens Public Library. If a candidate is interested in HIST 787, a faculty advisor can assist with available options. If accepted Fellows prefer to not enroll in HIST 787 or LBSCI 795, they must still meet the hourly requirements of the fellowship to ensure an equal experience for everyone in the program.
Applications are due March 6th. Qualified candidates will be invited for an online interview between March 14th-17th and all applicants will be notified of selections by March 21st. An online orientation meeting for accepted fellows will take place May 15th.
To Apply:
