Job Abstract

Department: Library Special Collections
Rank and Salary: Assistant Librarian to Librarian ($68,885 - $108,349)
Position Availability: Immediately
Application deadline for first consideration: August 30, 2024

The UCLA Library seeks a highly collaborative and inventive professional Librarian to lead the collection management team and stewardship of its rare and unique materials.

Reporting to the Director of Library Special Collections, the Team Leader for Collection Management is the Librarian who manages a team responsible for acquiring, accessioning, and cataloging special collections materials. This includes leading the development and implementation of flexible user-driven policies, procedures, and workflows for stewarding archival collections, digital archives, rare books, and manuscripts. They also provide recommendations and support to the Processing/Center for Primary Research and Training (CFPRT) Team for the processing and accessibility of materials.

The Team Leader for Collection Management collaborates with colleagues across LSC units to set priorities for the stewardship of archival and rare book collections; explores, proposes, and implements new technologies and sustainable approaches for collection management activities and workflows; and develops and implements a comprehensive and sustainable plan to increase the discovery of LSC’s collections. They embrace responsible and ethical stewardship and center equity, diversity and inclusion in all aspects of their work, ensuring a holistic approach to sustainable collection management.

The Team Leader for Collection Management optimizes current storage spaces and plans future solutions for anticipated storage needs. They will lead efforts to ensure appropriate inventory control, environmental control, and security of special collection materials and collection spaces. In collaboration with the Preservation & Conservation team, this position will integrate preservation and conservation workflows and assessment practices into pre- and post-custodial processes and implement interventions to ensure long-term sustainability of collections. They develop and prepare collection data for administration, donors, granting agencies, and the public. Additionally, the incumbent develops and leads a team of staff and student assistants to design and carry out collection management and discovery processes for archival collections (physical and born-digital) and rare books and manuscripts.

The successful candidate will be committed to promoting and enhancing diversity through engagement with and promotion of the UCLA Principles of Community.

Specific duties and responsibilities include:

• Supervises 2-3 FTE librarians and 4-5 FTE staff involved in accessioning, cataloging, post-cataloging and digital archives work. This includes overseeing and prioritizing work, providing feedback, and developing skills.
• Works with colleagues in LSC to optimize and manage collection storage spaces and plan for future needs.
• Collaborates closely with UCLA colleagues in Resource Acquisitions and Metadata Services, Preservation & Conservation, the Southern Regional Library Facility, as well as colleagues in special collections across the UC system.
• Cultivates a shared community of learning and growth among all team members, and actively pursues opportunities for staff professional development.
• Works closely with Library Development to identify and steward donors, collections, and endowed gift funds.
• Other responsibilities as assigned.

Professional librarians at UCLA are academic appointees. Librarians at UCLA are represented by an exclusive bargaining agent, University Council – American Federation of Teachers (UC-AFT). This is a represented position. They are entitled to appropriate professional leave, two days per month of vacation leave, one day per month of sick leave, and all other benefits granted to non-faculty academic personnel. The University has an excellent retirement system and sponsors a variety of group health, dental, vision, and life insurance plans in addition to other benefits. Relocation assistance may be provided.

Appointees to the librarian series at UC shall have professional backgrounds that demonstrate a high degree of creativity, teamwork, and flexibility. Such background will normally include a professional degree from an ALA-accredited library and information science graduate program. In addition to professional competence and quality of service within the library in the primary job, advancement in the librarian series requires professional involvement and contributions outside of the library, and/or university and community service, and/or scholarly activities. Candidates must show evidence or promise of such contributions.

As a University employee, you will be required to comply with all applicable University policies and/or collective bargaining agreements, as may be amended from time to time. Federal, state, or local government directives may impose additional requirements.

UCLA welcomes and encourages diversity and seeks applications and nominations from women and minorities. UCLA seeks to recruit and retain a diverse workforce as a reflection of our commitment to serve the people of California, to maintain the excellence of the university, and to offer our students richly varied disciplines, perspectives, and ways of knowing and learning.

Library Special Collections (LSC) builds and stewards special collections resources, services, and operations. The department consists of four teams: Curatorial; Processing/Center for Primary Research and Training (CFPRT); Collection Management (CM); and Public Services, Outreach, and Community Engagement (PSOCE).

• The Curatorial Team is responsible for collection development and acquisition of materials in support of research and teaching.
• The CFPRT makes collection material discoverable and accessible through ethical and iterative processing in a pedagogical model.
• The D&D Team develops and implements policies and processes to ensure responsible stewardship of collections.
• The PSOCE Team integrates public-facing operations for LSC including reference and instruction, programmatic events, and activities.

The entire staff of approximately 30 FTE work together holistically to build, preserve, and provide access to the outstanding rare and unique holdings of the UCLA Library. LSC works closely with our colleagues within the Distinctive Collections portfolio to steward a range of international resources in support of UCLA’s mission for the betterment of our global society.

As one of the world's great public research universities, UCLA integrates education, research, and public service so that each enriches and extends the others. From its beautiful neighborhood campus in a uniquely diverse and vibrant city on the Pacific Rim, teaching and research extend beyond the classroom, office, and lab through active engagement with communities, organizations, projects, and partnerships throughout the region and around the world.

UCLA’s diverse community of scholars encompasses nearly 30,000 undergraduates pursuing 125 majors, 13,000 graduate students in fifty-nine research programs, and 4,000 faculty members including Nobel Laureates; Rhodes Scholars; MacArthur Fellows; winners of the Fields Medal, National Medal of Science, Pritzker Prize, and Pulitzer Prize; and recipients of Oscars, Emmys, Tonys, and Golden Globes. UCLA ranks tenth in the Times of London Higher Education World Reputation Rankings, twelfth in the Academic Ranking of World Universities by Shanghai Jiao Tong University, and fifth in the U.S. by Washington Monthly. The National Research Council ranks forty of its graduate and doctoral research programs among its top ten.

To enable these accomplished students, faculty, and staff to create, disseminate, and apply knowledge for the benefit of global society, the UCLA Library is re-envisioning how it is acquired, synthesized, and shared across academic audiences and with the public. It was among the first academic libraries to develop subject-specialist librarians and to launch a program to enhance students’ research skills. Its Special Collections pioneered the acquisition by public institutions of rare and unique books, children’s literature, pulp and detective fiction, works by or about women and minorities, screenplays, architectural plans, and Los Angeles-related materials and today leads the way in collecting archival resources in digital format such as emails and manuscripts. It has launched innovative data management services and an affordable course materials initiative that have served as models for other libraries.

The Library serves UCLA students, faculty, and staff whenever and wherever they need its resources and expertise. Reconfigured, high-tech spaces and services in its ten campus libraries enable users and librarians to explore and work with print and digital materials collaboratively or individually, pursue new lines of inquiry, and develop new pedagogical approaches as well as novel forms of scholarship. More than 3.5 million people visit annually, while an additional 3.4 million visitors enter online through its virtual front doors.

Whether on campus or online, the Library forms the intellectual heart of UCLA, a hub for cutting-edge discovery, scholarship, and instruction.

The University of California is an Equal Opportunity/Affirmative Action Employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, disability, age or protected veteran status. For the complete University of California policy on discrimination, harassment, and affirmative action see: University of California – Policy Discrimination, Harassment, and Affirmative Action in the Workplace at https://policy.ucop.edu/doc/4000376/DiscHarassAffirmAction

Under federal law, the University of California may employ only individuals who are legally authorized to work in the United States as established by providing documents specified in the Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986. Employment is contingent upon completion of satisfactory background investigation.

Visit the Jobs @ UCLA Library website at: https://www.library.ucla.edu/about/jobs/

• ALA-accredited Master’s Degree in Library or Information Science required at the time of hire; OR Master’s degree (or other advanced degree) in Information Sciences or related field at the time of hire and work experience in a library setting.
• Professional experience working in special collections in an academic or research library, or other related setting.
• Supervisory experience that includes training and leading the work of librarians, staff and student assistants.
• Commitment to responsible stewardship and data and capacity-informed approaches to collections stewardship.
• Knowledge of preservation and conservation needs and interventions for special collection materials and spaces.
• Demonstrated experience with current and emerging standards and best practices for cataloging, metadata creation, and archival accessioning and processing.
• Demonstrated experience developing strategic initiatives, managing complex projects, and workflow assessment and implementation.
• Demonstrated experience managing and working with collection management technologies, such as ArchivesSpace.
• Excellent oral and written communication skills, organizational skills, and time management skills.
• Strong project management skills, with an ability to manage multiple projects simultaneously.

Applicants with all the above basic qualifications and any of the following preferred qualifications or professional experiences are strongly encouraged to apply: 1) Familiarity with the Guidelines for Efficient Archival Processing in the University of California Libraries, OCLC’s Total Cost of Stewardship toolkit, and other models that promote ethical and iterative approaches to description and access; 2) Experience collaborating with Development to identify priorities for philanthropic funding and to provide information for donor cultivation, solicitation, and stewardship; 3) Experience working with donors and with Deeds of Gift; 4) Reading and writing knowledge of additional languages relevant to our holdings, particularly diasporic languages spoken in Los Angeles; 5) Familiarity with best practices for processing and stewarding digital archives; 6) Evidence of professional engagement at local, state or national level.

• 3 required (contact information only)

As a University employee, you will be required to comply with all applicable University policies and/or collective bargaining agreements, as may be amended from time to time. Federal, state, or local government directives may impose additional requirements.

The University of California is an Equal Opportunity/Affirmative Action Employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, disability, age or protected veteran status.

For the University of California’s Affirmative Action Policy, please visit https://www.ucop.edu/academic-personnel-programs/_files/apm/apm-035.pdf.

For the University of California’s Anti-Discrimination Policy, please visit https://policy.ucop.edu/doc/1001004/Anti-Discrimination.