Listening to the Past, Speaking to the Future

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28working with the real materials cannot be underestimated,and can potentially be provided through the existingnetwork of local authority archives. Specialist repositoriesare also well placed to provide diverse content for teachingmaterials to engage teachers and thereby young users.Innovative content and projects are already being deliveredby a number of archive services through the provision ofin-service training, teachers’ packs, homework clubs,outreach activities, targeted projects and visits. Building onthis investment and releasing the learning potential of theUK’s archives will require advocating the role of archivesin teaching programmes with educators and teachers.Engaging teachers and lecturers in the selection andinterpretation process provides opportunities for continuingprofessional development. Raising awareness of archivesas a teaching tool to trainee teachers is crucial, as isestablishing partnerships with schools and otherinstitutions in order to trial resource packs and teachingsessions. To maximise the learning and education potentialof archives will require the establishment of a programmeof advocacy, information and training to raise awarenessamong teaching staff of the potential of archival materialto support the curriculum.A community archives service should be focused verystrongly around community use and identity as well asindividual users and lifelong learning. It will become amajor vehicle to push forward the part that archives canplay in promoting social inclusion, citizenship and socialjustice by using the examples in archives to illuminatecontemporary issues. It will be a place where keepers andmanagers of community-based collections of documents,photographs, and moving image and sound recordingsdraw attention to their archives and where users will beable to search through linked and cross-related contentsets. Interactive facilities will guide and help people torecord their stories and memories. Those interested in thearchives of particular communities will find them allelectronically co-located. The Task Force wishes to engagewith grassroots history and its under-resourcing byinviting those involved to share their experiences, theirenthusiasms, their histories and the digitised contentof their collections in community archives.Commanet, the community archive network serves as a recordof cultural history. Photo: Batley Community ArchiveEngaging Creative CommunitiesCommanet was set up in 2000 to enable communities tocreate their own archives and publish these in digital form.Using basic IT equipment and COMMA, an easy-to-usesoftware package, groups can digitise and storephotographic and video images, text and oral narratives.These databases are published in CD-ROM and onthe Commanet website (www.commanet.org). More than200 projects are underway in the UK, mostly fundedthrough the Lottery Awards for All scheme and basedin community centres, schools, libraries and museums.These projects are successful both in terms ofsustainability and in attracting people who might notusually get involved with formal cultural institutions.The idea for COMMA and Commanet grew out of a localhistory project in Batley, West Yorkshire, where teacherChris Levack assembled a photocopy archive of 5,000family photos brought in by local people. COMMA softwarewas developed by Polkaville, a local software co-operative.Public bodies are increasingly using community archivesto engage with local communities. Examples includeprojects run by the Children’s Society, the National RailwayMuseum, Norfolk Adult Education Department andCHIN (Canadian Heritage Information Network). Despiteits success, Commanet remains a voluntary organisation,run by a small core team with no direct public funding.
Access for All: a Gateway to UK ArchivesCommunity archives is the place where people of all agescan register their own archive in an electronic cataloguewhich will link them to like collections; a place whereinformation from the content within the Archives Gateway(and beyond) can be brigaded under topic areas andinterpreted or mediated by expert historians, geographers,scientists and archivists to produce learning packagestargeted at (researched) needs; a place to convertinformation into more useful knowledge packets.The exchange of information on notice boards and theinterface and interaction with the public sector partof the archives will – the Task Force believes – open upopportunities for greater awareness of the potential of thewidest range of records, new thinking on how theseresources can be harnessed for public benefit andpartnerships to identify common priorities and seek newsources of funding. There are models of good practiceupon which to build, such as The National Archives-ledMoving Here 4 , and there are many other local examples.It will be important to co-ordinate activities such as thelocal authority provision catering for local studies, thenational archival institutions’ provisions for family historyand genealogy studies, and the increasing development ofcommunity-based archives as cultural learning resourcesthat can help to sustain cultural diversity. Services couldbe added or developed in response to demand or availablematerial and resources. The Archives Gateway is anentirely flexible concept.It is the view of the Task Force that two specialist servicesshould be established at the outset. Business Park willaddress two clear archival needs: to create a focal point forbusiness archives and to offer the opportunity to engagewith the business community. A continuing problem inthe UK – a legacy from previous centuries – has been thereluctance to acknowledge the role that commerce andindustry play in supporting and developing the fabric ofsociety. However, the archival records of organisationscould provide useful learning resources to explain to therising generation the role of business past and present.Business Park will also be the place where businessarchives can register themselves and publish informationabout their collections and communicate with each othervirtually, sharing information. Business Park will fosterlinks with public archives and key customer constituenciessuch as schools.Tourist Central will help develop and encourage thegrowing ancestry tourism business by offering guidance tooverseas visitors on how best to prepare for a family historyvisit to the United Kingdom and how best to plan their timewhile they are here. It will enable tourist authorities toassemble family history content which will help potentialvisitors plan their trips as ancestry tourism continues to bea growth point within the tourist industry.All Just a Click Away:the Gateway to UK Archives …• Content storehouse, navigation tool, electronic map• One-stop shop for archival knowledge and advice• Virtual world where the local community archive will standshoulder to shoulder with national archives collections• Rich content for study, work, hobbies, family history orlocation and communities• Major agent for 21st century learning using the KnowledgeWeb and virtual learning environments to link to teachersand students• Curriculum, project work, lifelong learning support forchildren and families• Prepare for visits to the source material in archivesand records offices• Foster citizenship and community identity througha growing fabric of community groups and archives.• Celebrate cultural diversity and cultural historiesto be valued and respected• Grow new genres of archive – sound archives, digital, film,video archives – and enable electronic communitiesof interest and expertise to develop• Museums, Libraries and Archives Council in partnershipwith key stakeholder agencies• Cost-effective solution utilising existing infrastructureand personnel where possible29
Page 1 and 2: Listening to the Past,Speaking to t
Page 3 and 4: ForewordThe Museums, Libraries and
Page 5 and 6: Archives need thetools for the job
Page 7 and 8: Executive Summary and Recommendatio
Page 9 and 10: Executive Summary and Recommendatio
Page 12: 1The Importance of ArchivesThe arch
Page 15 and 16: The Importance of Archivesbrought i
Page 18 and 19: 18 DemandThe growing interest in pe
Page 20 and 21: Our approach hasbeen to develop and
Page 22: A Strategy for Action22‘ The Arch
Page 26 and 27: 26 of original documents. Digitisat
Page 30 and 31: 30 The Wider Digital EnvironmentWe
Page 32 and 33: 32 for formal education, packages t
Page 34: 4Developing Archives and AudiencesA
Page 37 and 38: Developing Archives and Audiencescr
Page 39 and 40: Developing Archives and AudiencesTh
Page 41 and 42: Developing Archives and AudiencesLe
Page 45 and 46: Developing Archives and AudiencesCo
Page 50 and 51: 50 The Task Force is confident that
Page 52 and 53: Archives ought to befertile ground
Page 54 and 55: 54Volunteers known as Will Flattene
Page 56: Funding, Recommendations, Next Step
Page 60 and 61: 60 four countries. Through MLA, a H
Page 62 and 63: 62 Action 5New services for the arc
Page 64 and 65: 64 Recommendation FourIncrease comm
Page 66 and 67: 66 Action 2Encourage regional partn
Page 68: Appendices68‘ An archival heritag
Page 71 and 72: Archives in 2004PlacesMotivation71
Page 73 and 74: Archives in 2004Audiovisual archive
Page 75 and 76: Archives in 2004Diversity of UK Arc
Page 77 and 78: Archive Networking Achievements to
Page 79 and 80:
Archive Networking Achievements to
Page 81 and 82:
AcknowledgementsCllr David HarmerRe
Page 83 and 84:
AcknowledgementsVictor BelcherSteve
Page 85 and 86:
AcknowledgementsEamon DyasBusiness
Page 87 and 88:
AcknowledgementsJane HubbardWisbech
Page 89 and 90:
AcknowledgementsJudith Middleton-St
Page 91 and 92:
AcknowledgementsVictoria RogersMaur
Page 93 and 94:
AcknowledgementsAlan WatkinAndy Whi
Page 95 and 96:
IMAGE CREDITS95(Unless presented ea
Page 97:
Museums, Libraries and Archives Cou
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