Calendars (since it's January)

Special Collections and Archives holds a complete run of University of Wales Calendars (Cardiff University had been a member of the University of Wales until 2004). They are a sequence of annual publications dating from the 1890s right up to the present day. They don't look particularly exciting, but they feature everything you could want to know about the running of the constituent Colleges of the University of Wales in a particular year, and are a surprisingly frequently consulted resource. For each year, they list the departmental staff and their positions, and the names of graduating students, along with their degree class and subject of study.

Over the years I've mainly used them to satisfy family history enquiries from all over the world. This sometimes involves the discovery that ancestors may have 'embellished' upon their academic achievements! They have sometimes had more unexpected applications - I once sent some copies of the Calendars and Prospectuses to an enquirer in America - she was required to send proof and details of her 1970s teaching qualification to the United States Government before they would permit her to practise as a teacher in the USA. In that case, the availability of those records made a real difference to someone's life.

I've been a fan of the Calendars since my interest was sparked a few years ago by an enquiry regarding the history of the health visiting profession. I used the Calendars to find the first mention of Health Visiting being taught, and traced the career of a woman who made a significant impact on the development of her field. Health visitors are now trained nurses and midwives, but it was not always so. In 1952, Mary Davies was the first to teach Health Visiting at the Welsh National School of Medicine, when she was appointed Health Visitor Tutor (above right). She worked alone, was one of few female academic staff, and was not granted status as a Lecturer. Her students worked towards a Certificate in Health Visiting.

In 1956, she co-authored an article for Public Health entitled 'Health Visiting: A Suggestion for the Future', Jan 1956, vol 69, no 4, pp. 74-6. The article proposes the 'professionalisation' of the heath visitor - the advantages of taking further qualifications to enable a health visitor (who is referred to in the feminine form throughout) to take on a specialist, consultant role, so that 'in status she would be recognised as an expert in her own field'. In this article Mary Davies proposes 'a University course of at least one academic year's duration,' to professionalise health visitors and acknowledge the importance of their role. She continued to work alone in her field for almost 20 years,  until she was appointed Lecturer in Heath Visiting in 1970. At this point her subject was offered as an undergraduate degree. She was awarded an MBE in 1972 (above left) in recognition of her work, and retired from the College in 1975. Today Health Visiting is taught at Cardiff University as part of a MSc in Specialist Community Public Health Nursing and is supported by ten academic staff.

I think Mary's a bit of a hero - and without the Calendars, her achievements would have been forgotten.

New beginnings

It's 2012, and time to breathe some life back into this blog! With the end of CPD23, and my increasing involvement with an 'official' work blog, I've been wondering how best to continue with Notes from the Basement, if at all. CPD23 no longer prompts and timetables my posts, and noteable events at work tend to be written up for the Special Collections and Archives blog, which I co-author.

I did think it would be nice to continue writing - in my own voice and in a more informal capacity - about life as an archivist working with rare books, and the kind of work and issues that crop up. Things which may perhaps be too insubstantial for the work blog, but nevertheless may interest others, and aid my own reflective practice. So if you've ever been curious about exactly what I get up to here in the basement, read on!

And finally...

The final thing!

For this we have been asked to put together a personal development plan - to identify gaps in experience and what we want to do next in our careers.


We create PDPs as part of an appraisal process at work, so this is really a summary of that.

The first priority for me is to complete the Archives and Records Association's Registration Scheme, as I think I may now have enough in my portfolio to attempt this (especially now I can include CPD23). It's something I have put off for too long, pleading a lack of time. But it's more due to a failure to allocate time - there's no deadline, so it naturally keeps dropping to the bottom of the priority list. If I had spent as much time on it as I have on CPD23, it would be done by now, with time left over! So my plan is to break what needs to be done down into chunks and schedule some deadlines into my diary, just like CPD23.

My second priority is to try and get more experience of working with our rare book collections. Right now I'm lucky to be able to do a little of everything, simply due to our small number of staff. If this were to change in the future, I wouldn't want to end up in a role which limits me to working solely with archives simply due to my official job title. I've been concerned about this for a while now, even to the point of wondering if I should take a second PGDip, this time in Library Studies. Aside from the fact that I can't really afford to do this, it also seemed pretty pointless when a lot of the basics of working with 'information' were covered on my archives course, and what I have is a very specific requirement to learn about non-circulating rare book collections. When Aberystwyth University announced the release of two Rare Books Librarianship modules which could be taken on a stand alone basis by distance learning, I jumped at the chance to enrol. So far I am really enjoying the modules and I think they will stand me in good stead for the future. I want to make sure that what I learn on them is applied in a practical way in the workplace, and I need to spend some time thinking about how I can make that happen.

And that brings CPD23 to an end! I've really enjoyed the experience and have been recommending it to anyone who will listen. I've taken away a great deal of useful information and tips which I'll continue to put to good use. Thank you to all involved in organising, structuring, contributing to and supporting CPD23, you are all marvellous.

Volunteering

Thing 22 looks at volunteering. In the days when I hoped to be a teacher, I spent many hours volunteering in primary schools, but I have never volunteered in the library sector. Unless you count being my school's 'lunchtime librarian' when I was 13 : )

I have been fortunate enough that volunteering was never a route I needed to consider, though it's one I would certainly have taken should it have been necessary. At Special Collections and Archives, I'm on the other side of the equation, dealing with requests for volunteering, and training and supervising volunteers we take on.

We take on very few volunteers, and this is not due to a lack of offers - quite the contrary. I always find it very hard to turn away offers of help, since it is always needed, but we lack spare workstations and sufficient staff available to train and supervise volunteers on a regular basis. The problem with offering work which requires less training is that the volunteer gains little from the experience. We believe that placements should be mutually beneficial, and with this comes the need for time and effort from both sides. My experience of working with volunteers has been very positive - all have been tremendously motivated, talented and quick to pick up new skills - so we hope one day to be in a position to offer more voluntary opportunities.