By Allie Moore, on June 3, 2012

On Monday, I start my internship at the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) in Washington, D.C. I’ll be working with the Social Media Office, based out of the Archives II location in College Park, MD.  The National Archives serves as the nation’s record keeper by preserving government records and making them accessible to the public.

NARA is on the forefront of adopting social media within the federal government. The agency recognizes the potential of these tools to enrich the interaction and communication among the three communities NARA serves: the NARA staff community, the government community, and citizen archivists. NARA has a well-developed strategy for social media; I encourage you to check it out.

During my time at NARA, I will work on the development and implementation of the Internal Collaborative Network (ICN), an internal social media tool that will allow staff to more easily communicate and work together. This is incredibly important for any organization, but as the National Archives is composed of a network of facilities that span across the county, communication and collaboration is paramount to the agency’s success.

To learn more about the ICN, check out the blog post of David Ferriero, Archivist of the United States. (Don’t worry, he has an acronym too: AOTUS.)

Along with the ICN project, over the 10 weeks of my internship, I will have the opportunity to contribute to NARA’s Our Archives wiki and the Citizen Archivist Dashboard initiatives. I’ll post more about these projects soon!

Next Monday, look for a post about my first week on the job. I bet there will be more acronyms to learn!