Vacancy: Deputy Digital Archivist

Department: Digital Repository of Ireland
Contract type: Fixed term (24 months)
Reports to: Digital Archivist, Digital Repository of Ireland
Responsible for: Providing advice and hands-on assistance to DRI members to facilitate the ingest, preservation and publication of their collections online.

Overview

The Academy is seeking applications for the position of Deputy Digital Archivist at the Digital Repository of Ireland (DRI). The Deputy Digital Archivist is a new role at the DRI, responsible for providing direct assistance to depositors in preparing and uploading their collections for publication on the DRI.  

The DRI is a certified trustworthy digital repository for the arts, humanities and social sciences, and is a national infrastructure for preserving and providing access to Ireland’s social and cultural digital data. The DRI also operates as a community hub for policy, advocacy, training and best practice in digital preservation, digital archiving, FAIR data management and Open Science. DRI is headquartered at the Royal Irish Academy. See: https://dri.ie/

The Royal Irish Academy is a predominantly publicly funded institution established for the promotion of learning in the sciences and humanities across the island of Ireland. The Academy’s latest strategic plan for 2019–23 is available here: https://www.ria.ie/strategic-plan.

Key purpose of role

The Deputy Digital Archivist will work closely with the Digital Archivist, Training and Engagement Manager and technical team to assess incoming digital collections and provide advice and hands-on assistance to DRI members to facilitate the ingesting, preservation and publication of their collections online.

The Deputy Digital Archivist will have responsibility for analysing and adapting metadata for digital collections to be uploaded to the DRI. The successful candidate will assist depositors with preparing their collections for ingestion to the DRI by providing advice on naming conventions, descriptive metadata and folder structure, by advising on the use of appropriate file formats and by ‘cleaning’ existing metadata using appropriate tools.

The successful candidate will join a busy multidisciplinary team and will also contribute to wider DRI projects, working groups and activities. The position is based at the Digital Repository of Ireland at the Royal Irish Academy.

Key accountabilities

The Deputy Digital Archivist is responsible for:

• Providing advice and expertise to depositors on DRI’s format, metadata and licensing guidelines and other policies, administering user accounts and responding to depositor queries
• Liaising with DRI’s technical team and depositors to troubleshoot ingesting of collections and facilitate efficient publication of collections
• Cleaning of metadata relating to digitised and born digital cultural heritage and social science collections
• Assisting with online and in-person training and delivering subject-specific expertise in follow-up sessions
• Working with the Digital Archivist and the technical team to review and improve publication and preservation workflows
• Participation in DRI taskforces and other working groups
• Any other duties as directed

Essential qualifications

• A relevant qualification in library, information or archival studies
• Demonstrable digital archiving working experience
• Experience or skills in one or more of the following: archives and libraries, digital preservation, digital repositories, metadata, content management and organisation, digital access and access rights
• Hands-on practical experience of one or more of the following: digital asset preparation, metadata cleaning, data and metadata format shifting and manipulation, data ingestion
• Familiarity with open-source software, command line or batch data cleaning tools used in digital preservation and archiving

Desirable qualifications

• Working experience with Dublin Core, MARC 21, MODs or EAD
• Some experience of developing and providing training in an online or live environment
• Some automation/scripting ability with language such as Python
• Some experience of OpenRefine
• Some knowledge of copyright law in Ireland

Further Information

Salary: Salary is on the Admin Officer / Programme Manager Scale, €39,195 - €51,090.  Candidates should note that entry will be at the minimum of the scale and the rate of remuneration may be adjusted from time to time in line with government pay policy. Candidates should note that different pay and conditions may apply if, immediately prior to appointment, the appointee is a serving civil or public servant.

Hours of Work: The normal hours of work are 35 hours per week.

Overtime is not paid in respect of excess attendance which, should it arise, is discharged by time off in lieu at times agreed in advance with the Executive Director.

This role is suitable for hybrid working.

Leave: The annual leave entitlement is 25 days per annum, pro-rata for shorter periods. Entitlement to leave for public holidays is in accordance with the terms of the Organisation of Working Time Act 1997. There is a requirement to take up to four days annual leave where the Academy is closed at Easter and Christmas.

Medical: Staff shall, if required, and at the expense of the Academy, submit to a medical examination by a registered medical practitioner nominated by the Academy and shall authorise such medical practitioner to disclose and to discuss with the Academy the results of the examination and the matters which arise from it so that the Academy can ascertain any matters that they consider might impair a staff member from properly discharging his/her duties.

Pension: Details of the appropriate pension scheme will be provided upon determination of appointee’s status.

Permanent Pension contribution: This appointment is subject to the Additional Superannuation Contribution (ASC) effective from 1 January 2019.

Application Process

Completed applications must be submitted electronically to recruitment@ria.ie and consist of:

• A brief cover letter demonstrating how you meet the qualifications and experience for the position (max. 2 pages)
• A curriculum vitae summarising your qualifications and relevant experience

Documents must be submitted in Word or PDF, and submissions that combine letter and CV into a single file are preferred. Applicants will be shortlisted based on information provided in their application. 

Please note: failure to fulfil the application requisites will deem the application invalid.

Closing date: 29 March 2023 at 12pm. Late applications will not be considered.

It is anticipated that interviews will be held week commencing 3 April 2023.

Please note this interview will include competency-based interview questions.

The Royal Irish Academy is an equal opportunities employer