GLAMx Lab Living Histories Digitisation Lab – engaging tertiary students with university archival collections

In 2016, the University of Newcastle’s (UON) Auchmuty Library embarked on a new venture to promote and augment an established Work Integrated Learning (WIL) course in the Bachelor of Arts (BA) degree course, and to provide for placements in Cultural Collections. One of the champions for the venture was Associate Professor Marguerite Johnson, who visited Cultural Collections with her ‘Sex and Scandal’ class in September 2016 and where they heard University Archivist Gionni Di Gravio’s vision to establish a GLAM^x Lab (i.e. Galleries, Libraries, Archives and Museums to the power of ‘x’) training facility. In 2017 the GLAM^x Lab Living Histories Digitisation Lab was established for students in the UON’s WIL programs across all faculties and disciplines. The Lab provides a unique opportunity in the tertiary teaching and learning sphere for students to engage in practical education and learn the technical know-how to be able to transform any physical format into a digital object, and access to the entire gamut of GLAM professions across conservation and preservation, archival science, librarianship, digitisation, metadata and data management, curatorial, 3D scanning, Virtual Reality technologies and digital heritage skills. The primary collaborators are the Academic Division (University Library) and Faculty of Education and Arts, Resources Division. IT Services, the Innovation Team and School of Wollotuka also played a role in the establishment of the Lab, although to a lesser degree. This project is a sector leader with only two other universities in Australia (Deakin University and the University of Melbourne) having similar programs engaging tertiary students with university archival collections. These two other universities presented a joint session at the 2017 Australian Society of Archivists Conference. University archives present a unique opportunity to challenge existing cultural, ethnic, racial, political, sexual and religious representation in the tertiary teaching and learning sphere. Four practitioners discussed developments at their campuses, highlighting successes and failures, surprises and roadblocks encountered to date, as well as presenting a brief overview of current research on archival teaching and learning programs in Australia’s tertiary institutions. Although these new programs differ, they each support diversity. A real strength is the inclusion of students from particular fields and how they are matched with specific collections and projects. Another strength is the support of Indigenous Australian volunteers and cadetships in the object-based learning environment. The following discussion outlines the project undertaken by the University of Newcastle.