Pam Brown and Karen Briner-Peterson were very excited when Friday arrived.
Gathering with other Jamestown Public School officials at Jefferson Middle School, Ms. Brown, the district's records management coordinator, and Ms. Briner-Peterson, director of human resources, gave representatives from the New York State Archives office and other dignitaries a tour of the district's newly constructed archive room.
''This has been a long time coming,'' Ms. Briner-Peterson said.
Article Photos
Representatives from the New York Archives Office, Jamestown Public School officials and other dignitaries tour the school district’s new records archive.
P-J photo by S. Alexander Gerould
Built as part of one of the district's capital projects, the room features large shelves which can be moved forward or backwards with the turn of a wheel. The room holds historical records from the district, and it contains digitized versions of the records on microfilm, which the district received a state grant to help fund.
''The school has a very rich archives,'' Ms. Brown said. ''There are some registers, we have school census books. We have a lot of really interesting information in our archives which are accessible.''
Only three people in the district have access to the archives, Ms. Brown said, which also contains artifacts collected by school janitors and other staff members.
''You won't see any of this ever going on eBay under Pam's watch,'' Ms. Briner-Peterson said.
Ms. Brown said it has been around three years since there has been a storage space - which is environmentally friendly - to adequately house the district's records.
''There were some attempts (in the past),'' Ms. Brown said of the previous storage space. ''This is pretty much the biggest thing we've done. It's a state-of-the-art record center. It holds the records for the entire Jamestown district.''
Ms. Brown said Jamestown Public Schools classes, or other individuals may donate items to the archives. She also said if the public wishes to access the archives, an appointment is necessary.
''It's about half capacity,'' Ms. Brown said.
Jim Tammaro, head of the Buffalo office for the New York State Archives Office, said he was impressed with the work Jamestown had done. He also said he would use the district as an example to other schools aiming to improve their record management capabilities.
''They've done incredible progress in terms of improving things,'' Tammaro said. ''We'll use Jamestown as a shining light.''
Question: Will you use the JPS archives for research?
Quote: ''We have a lot of really interesting information in our archives which are accessible.'' - Pam Brown, Jamestown Public Schools records management coordinator