2024 Election: Seeking Nominations

The Accessibility and Disability Section (ADS) Steering Committee is seeking nominations by Monday, May 27th for the following five (5) vacancies:

• Vice Chair/Chair-Elect: one (1) vacancy; one year as Vice Chair and one year as Chair.
• Steering Committee member: three (3) vacancies; two-year term.
• Student/early-career Steering Committee member: one (1) vacancy; one-year term.

The Steering Committee meets for up to 45-minutes once a month from September through May (nine meetings) and holds an open to the public business meeting in the summer that has historically featured presentations from ADS members on projects of interest to membership. An additional time commitment is expected of the Chair and Vice Chair but is optional of Steering Committee members, unless they choose to participate in event planning; maintaining the microsite, blog, or Twitter account; or supporting other projects.

Over the coming year, ADS will:

1. Advertise the first revision to SAA's Guidelines for Accessible Archives, which has been submitted to the Standards Committee for approval.
2. Advertise the launch of the book Preserving Disability through such events as National Disability Employment Awareness Month in October.
3. Collaborate with the Diversity Committee and other related sections on projects or events when possible, such as our April event with the new User Experience Section.
4. Continue to collaborate with the Membership Committee/Mentoring Subcommittee on the possibility of another mentoring cohort organized around disability.
5. Continue to collaborate with the Education Committee and SAA Education on the possibility of a workshop on navigating workplace culture as an archivist with a disability.

On a related note, our Immediate Past Chair will begin serving on the Membership Funding and Pathways for Diverse Archives Workers Task Force and report back to us as part of this work. We are also hoping for engagement with the yet-to-be-formed Archival Worker Labor Task Force.

ADS is the second-youngest section in SAA, but we have already been recognized with a 2020 SAA Council resolution and sent both of our co-founders to Council. As our founding Steering Committee members have now all rotated off, this is an exciting time to become involved and determine where we will go in the future.

Nominees should submit their name and email, title and institution (if applicable), and a bio with a statement of interest (no more than one to two paragraphs each) to saadisabilityarchivists@gmail.com. Ballot information will be transmitted to SAA on 1 June and ballots will open on 24 June and close on 15 July.

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