Purpose of award (summary of the goals and objectives of the project):the project will provide a hands-on collection-focused educational work experience opportunity for archeology, anthropology, and…

Purpose of award (summary of the goals and objectives of the project):the project will provide a hands-on collection-focused educational work experience opportunity for archeology, anthropology, and museum studies students. The purpose is to complement classroom instruction with hands-on work activities in a variety of areas and to learn and apply best practices for archival intake, arrangement, description, scanning, and storage of archives. The student will also gain experience reformatting scope of collections statements and prepare finding guides for conversion to 508 compliance by a vendor. The skills gained through this project will enhance student employability in several diverse fields. The study units facilitate multi-disciplinary science and integrated information products across multiple geographic regions of the national park system. Summary of project specific activities:this project funds the labor for arrangement, inventory and scanning tasks that will help the museum archives staff with accountability for existing and incoming collections. In addition, this project will assist national park service staff and the general public with access for research by arranging and describing contents of folders. Incoming archival items will be in-processed to prepare materials for final arrangement, cataloging and storage. New archives will be cataloged, and existing catalog records updated to describe the additional items. In addition to enhancing accountability for the NPS museum archives, these inventories facilitate their retrieval for research, both public and for staff. Storage will be consolidated and improved to promote preservation and efficient use of repository space.project objectives the objectives for this project include:1.in-process approximately 50 linear feet (about 80,000 items) of resource records.2.in-process before cataloging of approximately 75 linear feet (about 120,000 items) of cultural collections. 3.catalog approximately 50 linear feet (about 80,000 items) of records and 20 linear feet of archeological bag labels into the interior collections management system (icms). 4.scan and print approximately 25 boxes of archeological bag labels already arranged by NPS archivists. 5.improve long-term preservation of the collections reviewed or cataloged during this project by RE-boxing into acid-free containers and labeling. 6.improve discoverability of archival collections by preparing 100 finding aids for a contractor to make them 508 compliant for public use. 7.reformat five scope of collection statements to the new format to facilitate mandatory updates by parks. Performance goals including milestones and expected outcomes:the final project report, with a separate abstract, will summarize all work completed including final counts of accomplished tasks with the draft final report submitted by july 31, 2025 and the final report by august 30, 2025.beneficiaries:beneficiaries include state and local governments, federally recognized indian tribal governments, public private nonprofit organizations, nonprofit institutions of higher education, and the general public.