State of Maryland

An Archival Assistant II is the intermediate level of assisting professional archivists at the Maryland State Archives.  Employees in this classification assist professional Archivists in one or more of the following areas: Collections Management; Conservation; Image Acquisition; Constituent, Interagency Services, and Reference Services; Library; Maryland Manual; and/or Research. Employees in this classification do not supervise other positions.  

Employees in this classification receive moderate supervision from an Archivist Supervisor or other designated administrative staff..  Employees may work a rotating shift and may be required to work Saturdays and holidays.  Work is performed in an office and in record storage areas which are low temperature and low humidity environments.  The work requires climbing ladders and moving heavy objects to retrieve and reshelve manuscript books and boxes of records.

Positions in this classification are evaluated using the classification job evaluation methodology.  The use of this method involves comparing the assigned duties and responsibilities of a position to the job criteria found in the Nature of Work and Examples of Work Sections of a class specification.  

The Archival Assistant I, the Archival Assistant II, and the Archival Assistant III are differentiated based on the degree of supervision exercised by the supervisor over these employees.  The Archival Assistant I performs duties under close supervision. The Archival Assistant II performs duties under close supervision at times and under general supervision at other times depending on the complexity of the specific duty being performed. The Archival Assistant III performs the full range of duties and responsibilities under general supervision.

Processes archival collections of government documents and private papers (such as newspapers, photographs, maps, diaries, postcards, religious records, letters, and business papers);

Organizes, re-houses, describes inventories, and labels collections;

Adds indexing data to online catalogs;

Assists with the proper shelving and storage of collections; 

Assists with retrieving and returning records to the stacks;

Assists with collections care to properly store and preserve archival materials;

Makes wraparounds, boxes, and protective coverings for collection items;

Re-houses and moves records, art, and artifact series to proper storage locations;

Makes basic mending and repairs;

Assists with record retrievals and refiling for the general public; 

Utilizes proper records handling techniques;

Provides customer service;

Answers basic public inquiries using archival materials and updates the customer service database;

Scans record material, provide quality control and store images in the electronic archives for publication in catalogs for public access;

Assists in maintaining secondary source materials in the Archives’ non-lending library;

Assists with publication retrieval and refiling, shelf reading, accessioning new acquisitions of books and reports, updating the catalog, and labeling of new materials;

Assists with compiling and updating information about the executive, legislative, and judicial levels of state and local government for publication in the Maryland Manual Online;

Learns to research and write information for the web to create a guide to Maryland government agencies;

Conducts primary and secondary source research to contribute to archival projects; 

Mines records to add data to programs such as the Court Record Background Research, the Study of the Legacy of Slavery in Maryland, MAYIS Indigenous Peoples Project, the Maryland Women’s Hall of Fame, Maryland 250 Commission, Artistic Properties Commission and the Maryland Lynching Truth and Reconciliation Commission;

May give tours of the Archives and other associated buildings highlighting collections;

Performs other related duties;

Ability to use indexes and catalogs to locate documents and other collection materials;

Ability to arrange documents in alphabetical, numerical, or chronological order;

Education:   Completion of the Ninth grade.

Experience: One year of experience assisting professional archivists in the areas of Collections Management; Conservation; Constituent, Interagency Services, and Reference Services; Image Acquisition; Library; Maryland Manual; or Research.

Notes:

1. Graduation from an accredited high school or possession of a high school equivalency certificate can be substituted for the required experience.

2. Candidates may substitute U.S. Armed Forces military service experience as a non-commissioned officer in Archivist classifications or Archivist specialty codes in the Library and Archives field of work on a year-for-year basis for the required experience.

Employees may be required to lift up to 50 pounds when records shipments arrive and climb short ladders. Employees in this classification must exercise caution during the retrieval and replacement of heavy volumes from library shelves, particularly when using library ladders.  Employees may work a rotating shift and may be required to work Saturdays. 

Class specifications are broad descriptions covering groups of positions used by various State departments and agencies. Position descriptions maintained by the department or agency specifically address the essential job functions of each position.

This is a Skilled Service classification in the State Personnel Management System.  All positions in this classification are Skilled Service positions.  Some positions in Skilled Service classifications may be designated Special Appointment in accordance with the State Personnel and Pensions Article, Section 6-405, Annotated Code of Maryland.  

This classification is not assigned to a bargaining unit, as indicated by the designation of S (Supervisor), M (Manager), T (Agency Head), U (Board or Commission Member), W (Student), X (Used by Agency or Excluded by Executive Order), or Z (Confidential).  As provided by State Personnel and Pensions Article, Section 3-102, special appointment, temporary, contractual, supervisory, managerial, and confidential employees are excluded from collective bargaining.  Additionally, certain executive branch agencies are exempt from collective bargaining and all positions in those agencies are excluded from collective bargaining.  

Employees in this classification are eligible to receive overtime compensation. An employee who works more than the normal workweek is entitled to be compensated for that overtime as provided by State Personnel and Pensions Article, Section 8-305.  

This classification is one level in a Non-Competitive Promotion (NCP) series.  NCP promotions are promotions by which employees may advance in grade and class level from trainee to full performance level in a classification series.  To be noncompetitively promoted to the next level in an NCP series, an employee must: 1) perform the main purpose of the class, as defined by the Nature of Work section of the class specification; 2) receive the type of supervision defined in the class specification and 3) meet the minimum qualifications of the classification.