Department of Cultural Resources
State Doc Pick of the Week : Living history classroom : an educational service of the Tryon Palace Restoration
Looking for lessons or activities for your students that explore North Carolina history and culture? The Living History Classroom is published twice a year by the Tyron Palace Foundation and is available free of charge to schools and teachers. Issues include articles, short stories, puzzles and activities that utilize observational and critical thinking, research and discussion skills while celebrating the resources of Tryon Palace and its North Carolina History Center as well as New Bern and eastern North Carolina. The spring 2013 issue is all about food- how it’s produced, stored and prepared. It contains articles on learning how food was eaten before forks, spoons and plates; kitchen tools; North Carolina’s early experiences with beekeeping; barbecue facts; and how kitchen recipes evolved through combining America’s native foods with those brought to the states by African slaves and European settlers. Each issue contains a guide to show how each article and activity can align with the current grade-appropriate North Carolina Standard Course of Study. This issue is designed with the 4th-grade classroom in mind.
This publication can be downloaded, printed, saved, and viewed by clicking here.
Preservation Metadata for Digital Objects, NC Style
It’s National Preservation Week. On Monday, we announced a redesigned Digital Preservation Education website. Today, we’ve got another announcement specifically for North Carolina libraries, archives, and other institutions with digital files they want to preserve: we’re releasing a revised NC PMDO, or NC Preservation Metadata for Digital Objects.
Who needs the NC PMDO?
If you’re creating a digital collection by scanning images or documents, don’t just describe those files and throw them on the internet or a hard drive. Preserve your hard work! To help do that, preservation metadata is a must. The NC PMDO gives you a list of required, recommended, and optional metadata elements to record. If you’re completely new to metadata, try this brief description.
How do I use the NC PMDO?
You can record metadata in a number of ways – maybe just in a spreadsheet or database, maybe in a specialized content management system. We’ve tried to make the schema user friendly, with lots of examples. If you have more questions, just contact us.
How is this edition of the NC PMDO different from the first one?
This latest edition addresses born-digital files as well as scanned images. We also think it’s a little more streamlined – some elements that were more burdensome to record have been removed.
But we used the first edition of the NC PMDO. What do we do now?
Don’t worry. You can keep using the first version – many of the fields map to the elements in the new schema (see Appendix A in the new edition). You’re also welcome to adopt the new schema if you’d like to scale back on the amount of preservation metadata you record.
Special thanks to our NC PMDO draft reviewers at North Carolina State University Libraries and the North Carolina Digital Heritage Center.
Preservation Week: Redesigned digitalpreservation.ncdcr.gov launched today!
It’s national Preservation Week! Stay tuned to the blog for posts about all things digital preservation.
Today we’re starting BIG, as we unveil our redesigned digitalpreservation.ncdcr.gov. Now streamlined and mobile friendly, we hope our popular digital preservation website will continue to be your first stop in learning how you can keep your digital files accessible as long as possible. This site is a joint project of the State Library of North Carolina and the State Archives of North Carolina. Want to know more about it? Keep reading below…
Why do we have this site?
The State Library and State Archives have long been stewards of North Carolina print state government publications and records. Since the first state employee began using a computer, our responsibility has extended to the digital. We work hard to take care of that content according to industry best practices. Because digital preservation starts when you create a document (before it ever enters the Archives or Library), we also try to educate our customers about those best practices in an approachable way.
To help accomplish this in a cost-effective manner, in 2010 we launched digitalpreservation.ncdcr.gov. Now, it’s updated to make it even more approachable and flexible.
Who’s your audience?
Although we specifically hope state agency employees will find the site useful, it can be a starting point for anyone new to digital preservation.
What will I find there?
Start with the “Create” and “Manage” pages for the most fundamental first steps in managing digital files. Throughout the website, you’ll find hand-picked suggestions for how to learn more about digital preservation – from tutorials, to webinars, to great sources to follow on social media.
If you want to know what kinds of policies may apply to you as a state agency employee or are interested in examples of digital preservation-related policies, check out the aptly named Policies section. Finally, the “Presentations” page shows slide decks from grant-funded* talks we’ve given about digital preservation, digitization, and state government information.
But … huh?
It can be a tricky subject, digital preservation. But we’re here to help! Contact us at digital.info@ncdcr.gov or tweet us @digpres411 and we’re ready to answer your questions.
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*Creation of this site was supported by the Institute of Museum and Library Services under the provisions of the federal Library Services and Technology Act (LSTA), as administered by the State Library of North Carolina.
