The programme provides education in the management of records and archives in all formats from ancient manuscripts to email. It covers a range of areas including scheduling and retention, accountability, legislation, appraisal and acquisition, preservation, arrangement and description, management, ethics, access and advocacy. It also provides students with the tools to conduct theoretical research in archives and records management.
- Students should be able to demonstrate a thorough grounding in and knowledge of the principles underlying the theory and practice of the care and management of archives and records in all formats.
- Actively embrace the ethical and cultural responsibilities of the professional record keeper.
- Apply the skills of the archivist and records manager in a variety of working environments.
- Engage critically with current research trends and methodologies in archives and records management and appreciate their relevance to the workplace.
- Identify with the national and international community of archivists and records managers.
Teaching, learning and assessment is based on enabling students to complete assignments, both individually and in groups, which practically simulate the work of the professional record-keeper. An engagement with the theory behind contemporary practice is encouraged through presentations, essays and a minor research dissertation.
More generally, you will learn the skills to enable you:
- to work as a professional archivist and records manager in archives services and in other organisations which require professional expertise in corporate record services;
- to contribute to government and corporate accountability regimes;
- to contribute to the expansion of the profession in Ireland and elsewhere by establishing and managing new archives services and new corporate record services;
- to contribute to a sustainable environment for research and exploration in archivistics;
- to meet the challenges posed by technology, to work with records and archives in a variety of media and to address the demands of their capture, use and retention;
- to recognise gaps in collective memory, to develop inclusive collecting policies and to implement ways of reconstructing or supplementing archival sources;
- to encourage and provide access services to a range of stakeholders in the knowledge economy.