Description

About the Harry Ransom Center

The Ransom Center is an internationally renowned humanities research library and museum at The University of Texas at Austin. Its extensive collections provide unique insight into the creative process of writers and artists, deepening our understanding and appreciation of literature, photography, film, art, and the performing arts. Visitors engage with the Center's collections through research and study, exhibitions, publications, and a rich variety of program offerings including readings, talks, symposia, and film screenings.

The Ransom Center encourages discovery, inspires creativity, and advances understanding of the humanities for a broad audience through the preservation and sharing of its extraordinary collections.

Purpose

The Ransom Center seeks an energetic and experienced leader to join our team as the Associate Director for Preservation & Conservation. The Preservation & Conservation Division at the Ransom Center includes an expert team of six conservators plus preservation technicians who house, treat, and preserve book, paper, and photographic collection materials. 

This position provides vision and leadership for preservation and conservation initiatives of the Harry Ransom Center, including management of the Preservation and Conservation Division, composed of labs dedicated to book, paper, and photograph conservation, and a preventive unit. Serves on the senior leadership team of the Center.

Responsibilities

* Manage the Ransom Center Preservation and Conservation Division of approximately nine staff comprised of conservators and preservation technicians, strategically plan for and oversee division activities, and manage the departmental budgets and grant administration.
* Serve on the Ransom Center senior leadership team and other institutional committees as appropriate.
* Consult with the Ransom Center curators, librarians, and archivists to establish preventive and conservation treatment priorities, balancing institutional priorities with the needs of the active exhibition and loan program of the Center. Consult with Library Technical & Digital Services on a program of digital reformatting of sound and moving image recordings and long-term preservation of born digital content.
* Cultivate a culture of innovation and continuous improvement and foster the ongoing growth and professional development of the Center’s highly skilled conservators and preservation technicians through supervision, coaching, and mentoring.
* Maintain an effective disaster recovery plan and conduct periodic training and drills to ensure preparedness for a variety of threats to the collections of the Center. Train and educate the staff of the Center on proper handling of collection materials.
Investigate new strategies and technologies to address challenges to long-term preservation and access.
* Working closely with the Center’s Director and Chief Development Officer, conceive of and develop funding proposals to advance and sustain the Center’s preservation and conservation program, including project-based initiatives that further the collection care goals of the Center.
* Liaise with UT campus libraries, archives, and museums on various joint initiatives; lead and cultivate the Campus Conservation Initiative and chair the initiative’s Steering Committee
* Advise the Ransom Center Director and the Facilities Management Librarian on maintaining an optimum preservation environment for materials stewarded by the Center. Represent conservation priorities in long-range space planning and capital improvement projects. --* Act as back-up facilities manager when Facilities Management Librarian is away from the office.

Requirements

Education

Master’s degree/certificate from a recognized conservation education program or a Master’s in Library and Information Science with a certificate in conservation

Experience

* Minimum of 10-12 years post-graduate experience at progressively advanced levels of responsibility
* Minimum of 5 years of experience supervising conservators
* Minimum of 5 years managing a conservation lab
* Knowledge of the preservation needs of wide-ranging collection material types
* Ability to engage professionally with a wide range of individuals including colleagues, allied professionals, university administrators, and donors
* Demonstrated leadership and project management skills
* Demonstrated use of logic and reasoning to determine appropriate courses of action, or alternative solutions for a variety of preservation/conservation problems.
* Knowledge of conservation treatment and housing approaches for a variety of cultural materials held in libraries, archives and museums
* Familiarity with state-of-the-art preservation and conservation principles and methodology
* Demonstrated history of professional engagement in the field of conservation
 

Relevant education and experience may be substituted as appropriate.