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Education Program

Collections, Access, and Technical Services

Assessing Metadata for Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Accessibility in Cultural Heritage Institutions

Sunday, June 29, 2025
1:00 PM – 2:00 PM EDT
Location: Pennsylvania Convention Center, Room 105
Technical services departments of many cultural heritage institutions are interested in reassessing their long-standing metadata practices to reflect diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility (DEIA) concerns, which are often in line with institutional goals and priorities. At the same time, institutions may be wary of undertaking DEIA projects because of external scrutiny and the necessary investment to undertake this work. Using a metadata assessment to identify appropriate vocabularies and areas for improvement in existing metadata work enables institutions to strategically choose and implement remediation projects. This program will explore how libraries and archives have conducted DEIA-focused metadata assessments, including capacity analysis, implementation decisions, and tools needed, including lexicons and Python applications. Speakers will share their experiences with assessment and implementation of their own projects. Attendees will gain a holistic understanding of assessing metadata with a DEIA lens and how to make critical cataloging and reparative description a sustainable part of their work.

Learning Objectives:

  • Attendees will be able to identify tools and process methods needed for conducting DEIA-focused metadata assessments.
  • Attendees will learn how to solicit engagement with stateholders including end users.
  • Attendees will gain practical strategies for creating procedures and workflows for assessing, creating, and updating metadata as part of a DEIA effort.