Journey to 100 Graduate Internship

In 2029, The Henry Ford will celebrate its 100th Anniversary, and to support activities being planned for that celebration, the Archives and Library is launching a multi-year project centered on increasing access to the historic business records of the institution. Project work will involve many archival processes including inventorying, shelf reading, cataloging, arrangement, description, and digitization.

To aid us in achieving our project goals, we are offering a “Journey to 100” Graduate Internship which will provide a graduate student in information or archival sciences the opportunity to gain real-world experience in preparing these archival records for use.

For Summer 2023, focus will be placed on quantifying our holdings at a high level, insuring, for example, that each accession is cataloged in the collection management system and that the status of description of each accession is determined.

Working with the Archives Technical Services Team, duties of the intern will include:

  • Creating records for un-cataloged collections.
  • Assessing status of description for collections.
  • Creating minimum-level finding aids for collections lacking description.
  • Processing of one or more small collections.
  • In addition, at the completion of the internship, with assistance and input from appropriate staff, the student will present a synopsis of the project to an audience of The Henry Ford staff.

Skills and abilities required:

  • Interest in gaining experience with description and access of archival collections.
  • Understanding of archival description standards and practices.
  • Strong writing and communication skills, and attention to detail.

Successful completion of the internship will give the student experience with:

  • Requirements for the description of, and provision of access to, archival collections.
  • Experience with a non-archives focused collection management system.
  • Adapting and applying best practices to a working archive.
  • Working in the multi-disciplinary environment of a museum archive.

Qualifications:
Current or recent graduate students enrolled in a master’s degree program in Library and Information Science with a concentration or strong focus on archives.

Terms:
This is a paid 12-week full-time (40 hours per week) internship. Starting and ending dates are negotiable, with the internship expected to start during May and end during August.

Application deadline:
The deadline for application is Friday, March 10, 2023 (emailed by 11:59 PM EST).

To Apply:
Please submit a cover letter, resume, and names and contact information for two references to HistoryInternship@TheHenryFord.org. Include the position title in the subject line.

For more information on the Benson Ford Research Center and the Archives and Library, please visit https://www.thehenryford.org/collections-and-research/.