Thank you for your interest in attending a Digital POWRR Institute! Further details on future events, such as exact dates and locations, will be added to this page as the events are formally scheduled. If you are interested in working with POWRR to bring an institute to your area, please get in touch!
Applications for our Seattle institute (May 14-16, 2025) have closed. The POWRR team is now seeking further funding so that we can continue to put on these foundational training events.
The initial “POWRR Professional Development Institutes for Digital Preservation” grant (2017-2019) enabled project staff to organize and hold five two-day professional institutes which enabled librarians and archivists from small and mid-sized institutions to build skills for curating and preserving digital collections. A new round of generous funding from the National Endowment for the Humanities, will allow POWRR the ability to put on 5 more institutes in 2023-2025. The new institutes have been retooled in response to past attendee feedback and evaluations, and as a result, are now 2.5 days long rather than 2. As was the case with the original institutes, the new events incorporate hands-on technical training, engagement with institutional case studies, and one-on-one consultations with practitioners drawn from the digital preservation field. Attendees are assigned to a small cohort with a cohort facilitator who they work closely with throughout their time at the event, Attendees depart the institutes with a personalized and actionable preservation plan that will enable them to take action upon returning to their institutions. Due to the demand for this type of training, participants for each institute are selected through a competitive application process. 30 attendees are selected for each institute event. Events are free of charge, with travel scholarships offered to those demonstrating financial need. (Please note: due to U.S. federal grant regulations, we are unable to provide scholarship funds to international applicants.)
An ideal candidate for a POWRR institute may be someone who fits some of these descriptions:
- Someone who works directly with collections, including digital materials
- Someone who has been exposed to basic digital preservation concepts, but who has struggled with moving from theory to practice
- Someone who represents or serves historically underrepresented populations
- Someone who is comfortable with basic technology, (navigating a basic computing environment) but who would benefit from instruction on more intermediate concepts
- Someone employed by an institution unable to provide professional development funding adequate to attend other digital preservation training opportunities
- Someone who would benefit from being a part of a small cohort of professionals like themselves, and who will put forth effort into sustaining these professional connections after the end of the Institute
Curious about the content covered at a POWRR Institute? The agenda and session descriptions for Institute #1 are available, as are the other materials used at the event. Please be aware that we make changes to our curriculum/sessions between events due to feedback received from participants, as well as instructor availability.
Calendar of Institutes
| Institute | Location | Application Goes Live | Application Deadline | Institute Dates |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Institute One | Naperville, IL – NIU Naperville Conference Center (map) | April 25, 2023 | May 19, 2023 | July 24-26, 2023 |
| Institute Two | Tucson, AZ (University of Arizona Library) | August 8, 2023 | September 5, 2023 | January 3-5, 2024 |
| Institute Three | Stillwater, OK (Oklahoma State University Library) | January 15, 2024 | February 9, 2024 | June 5-7, 2024 |
| Institute Four | Honolulu, Hawai’i (University of Hawai’i at Mānoa Library) | May 14, 2024 | June 17, 2024 | October 16-18, 2024 |
| Institute Five | Seattle, Washington (University of Washington Library) | January 6, 2025 | February 7, 2025 | May 14-16, 2025 |
Questions?
Reach out to digital.powrr.workshops at gmail.com or @digitalPOWRR on Twitter
*Any views, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed in the Digital POWRR Institute, do not necessarily represent those of the National Endowment for the Humanities.
