Implementing Digital Preservation at the University of Houston

Developing digital preservation and access programs presents both challenges and opportunities. Challenges include selecting and implementing software and systems appropriate to the needs of the institution and advocating for digital preservation to ensure institutional buy-in for a sustainable digital preservation program. On the other hand, creating a digital preservation and access program also presents opportunities for creative problem-solving, collaboration, and innovation. The University of Houston is transitioning from a homegrown digital preservation workflow to the integrated software tools offered in Archivematica. The presentation will touch on planning and prep work for implementation, creating a cross-departmental working group on systems integration, providing reading room access to digital collections materials, and addressing workflow issues with preserving unprocessed or minimally arranged/described digital collections.