Volume 12, Number 8
Dec 1988

News

Education

• In January, representatives from eight countries will take part in a three-month training program at the Los Angeles Public Library, organized by Columbia University and Airdex Corporation. The program aims to give conservators first-hand knowledge in the recovery of water-damaged library materials using dehumidification and vacuum technology.
• At the Canberra Centre for Advanced Education, the conservation school in Australia, a new unit entitled Library and Archives Preservation was introduced this year, with the cooperation of Australian Archives and the National Library of Australia.
• The Association of Research Libraries (ARL) has received a grant of $145,167 from the NEH Office of Preservation in support of preservation planning in research libraries. The three-year grant will help provide training for six experienced preservation librarians to serve as consultants to libraries participating in the Office of Management Services' Preservation Planning Program. It will also support ten more self-studies and an evaluation of the whole program by Margaret Child, Assistant Director for Research Services at the Smithsonian Institution Libraries.

Role Seen for Mid-Sized Libraries in Microfilming Program

The role of mid-sized libraries in the nationwide brittle book preservation program will be explored by a committee of the Commission on Preservation and Access, chaired by Paula Kaufman, Dean of Libraries of the University of Tennessee. The reformatting of three million volumes over a three-year period, with funds recently made available through the National Endowment for the Humanities, is based on the concept of a sustained funding commitment to a core group of large research libraries that will form the basic framework of the program. However, because of the diverse and dispersed nature of American research collections, many other libraries with special collections and strengths in a variety of disciplines will be called upon to participate in the program as it develops.