Category Archives: Advocacy and Outreach

Archives Month 2021: Make Plans, Share Your Plans, Sign Up to Give a Virtual Tour!

October is American Archives Month and we want to take the opportunity to highlight and celebrate archives all throughout Ohio!  This year, the Society of Ohio Archivists Advocacy and Outreach Committee would like to offer a few virtual opportunities in October to invite the public “in” to our archives.

We have set up four dates on Tuesday afternoons in October to allow Ohio archival repositories to sign up to give a brief virtual tour during a one-hour Zoom meeting. This is a chance to show off your place, your coolest things, whatever you’d like!

  • The one-hour Zoom meetings are on Tuesdays. October 5th and 19th are at 12:15 pm, and October 12 and 26 are at 2:15pm.
  • Each Tuesday time slot can have up to 6 archives providing a tour, giving 8-10 minutes per archive (pre-recorded or live–your choice!).
  • (Multiple employees/representatives from an archive are welcome to attend the Zoom where your organization will be featured.)
  • Sign up for your preferred date and tour time using the form here: https://cutt.ly/OhioArchiveTours.
  • After signing up, you’ll receive the link for your date.
  • We’ll share a graphic/flyer that can be shared with details of how the public can join each session.
  • In addition, organizational representatives can join to watch and chat/ask questions on any of the other dates if they just want to see other archives!
  • See the virtual tours from our June Annual Meeting.

This is a fun opportunity for us archivists too, not just the public! We hope you can join any of the days available!

Other ways to celebrate Archives Month

Hold an Event: If your archive site hasn’t made plans yet to do something to celebrate and acknowledge Archives Month, we encourage you to hold some sort of event (in person or virtual) to let people get to know your archives!

Let us know: If you already have something planned (like an open house, talk, etc.), please share the details so that we can publish a list of Ohio Archives Month activities around the state on the SOA website. You can send event details to Advocacy and Outreach Committee Cochair Natalie Fritz.

Virtual Meet-Up: Post-SOA Annual Meeting, Wed June 9

The Society of Ohio Archivists Advocacy and Outreach Committee is hosting a virtual informal “Meet-Up” on Wednesday, June 9, 2001 at 3pm (Eastern), via Zoom.

This will be a fun opportunity for Ohio archivists to get together, following the virtual SOA Annual Meeting on June 7-8. There will be trivia and an opportunity to share and chat with fellow archivists.

Registration is required to receive the meeting link. Please email Connie Conner to register.

We hope you can join!

Questions? Contact the Advocacy and Outreach Committee Cochairs Natalie Fritz and Jenifer Baker.

Vote for 2021 Archives Month Poster Images Now!

SOA’s Advocacy and Outreach Committee is pleased to announce that voting is now open for images for inclusion on the 2021 Ohio Archives Month poster!

We have some fantastic submissions of images of Ohio’s outdoor spaces, with more than 20 organizations participating this year. Now we need your votes!

How To Vote

  • Voting begins Monday, April 19 and ends Friday, May 7, 2021.
  • Vote for your top ten images by selecting/clicking on the image, which will highlight the selection in blue.
  • Once you’ve made your selections, click the arrow at the bottom on the page to record your vote.
  • You can choose up to, but no more than, ten images for your vote to be counted.
  • Please only vote once.
  • Click here to vote

Once voting is complete, the winner(s) will be notified via email. Continue reading →

Social Media Engagement Calendar for Ohio Archives Released for 2021

The Society of Ohio Archivists Advocacy and Outreach Committee announces a new project–a 2021 Social Media Engagement Calendar for Ohio Archives.

This Google Doc features lots of social media engagement opportunities. It includes monthly observances and holidays (both national and international), known hashtag prompts, and general information that will hopefully provide you and your archival repositories with new outlets for sharing material, interacting with fellow archives, and interacting with the public.

A&O plans to provide yearly updates. There are probably many things we’ve missed on the list, so please feel free to share with us any other special days, hashtags, and opportunities for engagement throughout the year if you don’t see them listed! We’ll continue to add to the calendar as we learn new things!

Questions or Dates to Add? Contact the Advocacy and Outreach Committee Cochairs Natalie Fritz and Jenifer Baker.

Call for Image Submissions: 2021 Ohio Archives Month Poster

This year for the annual Society of Ohio Archivists’ October Archives Month poster we are looking for archival image submissions having to do with nature, outdoor recreation, and outdoor tourism in Ohio, due by April 2. Scroll down for all the details!

For the past year, many have been cooped up indoors and apart from others more than ever before, but the outdoors have always offered an escape! With this in mind, we decided to highlight Ohio’s outdoor spaces in this year’s Archives Month poster.

Does your archive have great images of local parks? People hiking? Picnicking? Enjoying the great outdoors? Ohio is filled with local, state, and federal parks to enjoy, outdoor attractions, and more. Do you have people represented in your archives instrumental to parks development? All of these are examples for wonderful submissions! Continue reading →

Virtual Meet-Up for Ohio Archivists, March 3, 2021

The SOA Advocacy and Outreach Committee is hosting a virtual informal Meet-Up on Wednesday, March 3 at 3pm via Zoom as an opportunity for Ohio Archivists to get together. As we approach the one-year mark since the world began to shut down due to COVID-19, the Committee thought this would be a good time to have a brief afternoon get together to chat with each other. Please join to chat with fellow archivists!

Meeting Info:
Topic: Society of Ohio Archivists Virtual “Meet Up”
Time: March 3, 2021, 03:00 PM Eastern Time (US and Canada)
Register here for the Zoom meeting; registration open through meeting time.

We hope you can join!

Questions? Contact the Advocacy and Outreach Committee Cochairs Natalie Fritz and Jenifer Baker.

Ohio Archives Month 2020 Poster: Ohio Women and the Fight for the Right to Vote

Ohio Archives Month Poster 2020This year’s theme for the Ohio Archives Month poster was Ohio Women and the Fight for the Right to Vote, to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the ratification of the 19th Amendment, which expanded the women’s suffrage across the country. We invited repositories and institutions across the state to submit their photographs, documents, or other graphical materials that exhibit a connection to this year’s theme. (Download the poster as 3MB PDF.)

The SOA Advocacy and Outreach Committee received submissions on the theme from 7 institutions, for a total of 13 photographs and documents! The submissions were compiled, and 3 images were selected by the designer for the final poster. Due to COVID-19 and many archivists not having access to their collections, we had considerable fewer submissions this year, but we hope you can submit your images next year.

See our 2020 poster page for more about the images featured on the poster from the Community Archives of Patricia Smith Griffin, and the Ohio History Connection, as well as the others submitted, and the full text of the poster.

2020 Archives Month Poster Submissions Mosaic (not on poster)

2020 Archives Month Poster submissions not included on the poster.

Thank you to the following institutions for their participation: Clark County Historical Society; Case Western Reserve University; Community Archives of Patricia Smith Griffin; Logan County History Center; Oberlin College Archives; Ohio History Connection; and The Ohio State University Rare Books and Manuscripts Library.

We hope everyone takes the opportunity this Archives Month to promote their institution and collections. We look forward to hearing from you over the month. Be sure to check the SOA website and Twitter account regularly for updates on the various Archives Month activities throughout the state!

Questions? Contact the Advocacy and Outreach Committee Cochairs Natalie Fritz and Jenifer Baker.

Virtual Meet-Up for Ohio Archivists, Aug 13, 2020

The SOA Advocacy and Outreach Committee is hosting a virtual informal Meet-Up on Thursday, August 13 at 3pm via Zoom. This is an opportunity for Ohio archivists to get together to chat about the COVID-19 survey archives results, reopening, policies and procedures, and more!

Join us to chat with fellow archivists!

Meeting Info:
Topic: Society of Ohio Archivists Virtual “Meet Up”
Time: Aug 13, 2020 03:00 PM Eastern Time (US and Canada)
Register here for the for Zoom Meeting, registration open through meeting time.

We hope you can join!

Questions? Contact the Advocacy and Outreach Committee Cochairs Natalie Fritz and Jenifer Baker.

Survey Results! Reopening Procedures & Effects of COVID-19 Pandemic in Ohio

COVID-19 Re-Opening Survey Summary thumbnailA few weeks ago, the Society of Ohio Archivists Advocacy & Outreach Committee sent out a survey to Ohio archival repositories to gather information regarding reopening dates, effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on staffing, and new procedures and policies implemented in response to COVID-19.

We are now ready to share the Ohio Archives Repository COVID-19 Re-Opening Survey Summary (PDF), a visual representation of the results. If nothing else, we hope that this survey provides a general overview of how archives were affected for posterity. We hope that some might find reassurance in seeing others responding similarly and/or get ideas and guidance.

Discuss it at a virtual meet-up on Thursday August 13, 3pm.

Continue reading →

Survey: Reopening Procedures & Effects of COVID-19 Pandemic in Ohio

COVID-19 graphic from the CDCThe SOA Advocacy and Outreach committee is conducting a survey of Ohio archival repositories to gather information about reopening procedures and effects of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Access the survey here: https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/WWJPWZF

Deadline to complete the survey is Friday, July 24. We hope to share the results within 2 weeks following the close of the survey.

Note: While repository name is asked, it is used only to filter duplicate responses and will not be associated with any reported results.

Thank you for your participation!

Questions? Contact the Advocacy and Outreach Committee cochairs Natalie Fritz and Jenifer Baker.