February 27, 2011 (REVISED March 2, 2011) "Preservation Roadmaps for the 21st Century" Symposium To Examine Options for Large Collections, March 15

The Library of Congress on March 15 will present “Preservation Roadmaps for the 21st Century: Assessing Options for Large Collections,” a symposium to evaluate and review the three current best-practice options for the management and care of large-scale general collections, including environmental control, mass deacidification and digitization. The day-long program, from 9 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. on Tuesday, March 15, is the second in a three-part series, Future Directions Symposia, organized by the Library’s Preservation Directorate. Presenters at the symposium will include directors and managers of mass-deacidification and mass-digitization programs and low-temperature/high-density repositories from the United States and abroad, as well as experts from the Library of Congress. The program also will include optional tours of the Library’s Mass Deacidification Facility, the Digital Scanning Center and the Low-Temperature/High-Density Repository at Fort Meade. Collections-care and project-management staff in cultural institutions are invited to register for the symposium, which will be held in the Mumford Room on the sixth floor of the James Madison Building, 101 Independence Ave. S.E., Washington, D.C. For program and registration information, visit www.loc.gov/preserv/symposia/assess/. The Library of Congress has a long history of implementing state-of-the-art options for maximizing care and access for large collections. The Library is at the midpoint of its 35-year “One Generation” mass-deacidification program to treat 35 million items. The Library continues to construct multiple low-temperature/high-density remote storage repositories slated to eventually hold 25 million items. At the same time, the Library has an active digital conversion program to capture legacy collections for electronic access. Along with acquisition of electronic copyright deposit, electronic serials and other digital assets, the conversion continues to expand the Library’s digital holdings. “Assessing Options for Large Collections” follows the Library’s first program of the series presented last October, “Understanding the Physical Environment.” The third installment will be “Transitioning to a Digital Future” in October 2011. The three-part series intends to cover the journey that stewards of the human cultural record have made and explore the future challenges they face. The March 15 symposium is sponsored by the Library’s Preservation Directorate and the Council on Library and Information Resources (CLIR), with additional support from the American Institute for the Conservation of Historic and Artistic Works. The mission of the Library’s Preservation Directorate is to assure long-term, uninterrupted access to the intellectual content of the Library’s collections, either in original or reformatted form. The directorate coordinates and oversees all Library-wide activities relating to the preservation and physical protection of Library materials. For more information, visit www.loc.gov/preserv/. CLIR has been a leader in fostering the management and expansion of the public’s access to digital and non-digital information. CLIR was created in 1997 as an independent, nonprofit organization through the merger of the Council on Library Resources and the Commission on Preservation and Access. The Library of Congress, the nation’s oldest federal cultural institution and the largest library in the world, holds nearly 147 million items in various languages, disciplines and formats. The Library serves the U.S. Congress and the nation both on-site in its reading rooms on Capitol Hill and through its award-winning website at www.loc.gov.