Abstract

Between 2023-2024, staff of the University Archives at the University of Kentucky Libraries Special Collections Research Center (Lexington, Kentucky, United States) reviewed the sustainability of our web archiving program. Preserving our institution’s vast web presence is technologically demanding, requires ongoing specialized expertise, and is underfunded. It is also absolutely necessary: If university archives do not determine how to sustainably acquire, preserve, and provide access to online documents, we will suffer (and already have experienced) significant gaps in our understanding of the university’s actions, events, and decisions. We used Kristin R. Eschenfelder, et al.’s “nine dimensional framework for digital cultural heritage organizational sustainability” (2019) and the Socio-Technical Sustainability Roadmap (STSR). At the end of our review (presented at the 2024 International Internet Preservation Consortium conference), we identified four issues and possible solutions to the goal of arranging and maintaining people, resources, and work practices that keep web archiving functional and accessible over time, given ongoing and anticipated challenges. One issue was the complexity and constant change of the university’s main seed, uky.edu. Two of the solutions were to build relationships with records creators and to develop automated processes, both of which have the potential to reduce staff effort and use scarce resources effectively. We are pursuing these through ongoing collaborations with the university’s Public Relations and Marketing team. In this presentation, two archivists and the university’s digital content strategist will discuss our Digital Communications Working Group; the initiatives and processes so far developed; and our discovery that creating a better preservation process for university permanent records is a two-way street that allows record creators and communications specialists to better adhere to accessibility and governance policies as well as inform structural changes to the university web platform. Through collaboration, we can improve preservation while minimizing disruptions to current content workflows.

Document Type

Presentation

Publication Date

10-27-2025

Notes/Citation Information

International Council on Archives Section on University and Research Archives, Barcelona, Spain

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