DOI: 10.3886/icpsr38827.v1
title: A*CENSUS II Administrators Survey, United States, 2022
title: Version 1

description: The Archives Administrators Survey endeavored to reach administrators leading archives in the United States. Archives administrators are defined as the most senior leaders and decision makers at their archives, regardless of archive size. Administrators may oversee large archives organizations, archives departments or units situated within broader institutions, or community archives collections. Archives administrators may manage employees or volunteers or, in some cases, may be the sole steward of an archival collection. Respondents were asked about the characteristics of their archives department or organization; staff scope; administrator responsibilities; recruitment and retention; funding and spending; organizational strategy; diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility; the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic; upskilling and professional development; and community archives. Demographic variables include respondents' years in their current role, total years of experience, degrees, age, gender, race, and sexual orientation, as well as whether they are transgender, have a disability, or are a care-giver.
description: The purpose of this study is to gather information on the hiring, budget, strategic direction, accessibility, and diversity, equity, and inclusion practices of archives departments and organizations in the United States as well as perspective of archives administrators on key issues in the field.
description: The survey for this study was developed collaboratively by a group of advisers. Through an iterative process, relevant themes important to the archive profession, were generated and agreed upon. These themes were used to create questions that center on topics such as diversity, equity, and inclusion, hiring, and recruitment.
Once the first draft of the survey was completed, the survey was reviewed and honed multiple times by members of the Society of American Archivists (SAA) workgroup. The survey underwent a final review where 12 administrators across the archive sector interviewed to test the efficiency of the survey.
description: Variables in this study include responses regarding hiring practices, archival budget, diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility archival practices, and archival policies during COVID-19.
description: No weight(s) made available for this study.
description: Response Rates: This study reached participants through direct email invitations to individuals, direct email invitations to organizations' general inboxes, and through publicly posted open-access links. The response rate for direct email invitations to individuals is 50%. The response rate for direct email invitations to organizations' general inboxes is 6.98%. The response rate for open-access links is unknown due to the nature of publicly posted links (i.e., it is unknown how many archives administrators saw the open-access link and chose not to take the survey); due to this it is not possible to calculate a response rate for the full sample of survey respondents.
description: The population for this survey is administrators leading archives in the United States. Archives administrators are defined as the most senior leaders and decision makers at their archives, regardless of archive size. Administrators may oversee large archives organizations, archives departments or units situated within broader institutions, or community archives collections. Archives administrators may manage employees or volunteers or, in some cases, may be the sole steward of an archival collection. To reach this population, the researchers used a three-pronged approach. First, the Society of American Archivists worked with partner organizations to produce a list of institutional email addresses. These email addresses were not personalized to an individual. This list was cleaned and deduped, ultimately resulting in 4,917 distinct email addresses. Of the 4,917 initial invitations sent, 2,168 bounced, bringing the updated list of institutional email addresses to 2,749. Second, after individual archivists completed the first A*CENSUS II survey (All Archivists survey) they were given a description of the Archives Administrators survey population and asked if they met the criteria to be invited to this second survey. Respondents who self-identified themselves as administrators were invited to provide their name, email, and institution/organization in order to receive the Archives Administrators survey. They were also offered the opportunity to recommend up to three administrators of other archives and provide their contact information. Respondents who self-identified themselves as not meeting the criteria to be included in the Archives Administrators survey were given the opportunity to recommend up to three administrators who they felt did meet the criteria. The resulting list was cleaned and deduped, yielding 1,352 individual email addresses. Of the 1,352 personalized email invitations, 562 bounced, resulting in an updated list of 790 individuals. Third, since the researchers' goal was to reach as many administrators leading archives as possible, including those leading large organizations, departments within broader institutions, and community archives, the researchers created and distributed open-access links to the survey instrument. These links were widely marketed on social media platforms including Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn by SAA, Ithaka S+R, the A*CENSUS II working group, and partner organizations. 1,698 individuals started the Archives Administrators survey through an open-access link. In total, after cleaning the data, the three methods to reach archives administrators resulted in 746 valid, complete responses.
description: Datasets: 
DS1: A*CENSUS II Administrators Survey, United States, 2022
description: Administrators leading archives within the United States. Smallest Geographic Unit: Region
description: web-based surveyFor additional information on the A*CENSUS II Administrators Survey, please visit the ITHAKA S+R website.