Celebrating Dr. Michael Kurtz’s Accomplishments at the DCIC Center
The DCIC staff (past, present… and future) were very honored to celebrate Dr. Michael J. Kurtz for his leadership and (too) many (to count) contributions at the University of Maryland, most recently as the Associate Director of the Digital Curation Innovation Center (DCIC) in the College of Information Studies.
Celebrating with DCIC members (past, current, and future) on May 9, 2018: Standing (left to right): Myeong Lee, Sohan Shah, Bill Underwood, Greg Jansen, Richard Marciano, Ken Heger, Will Thomas, Mary Kendig, Katrina Fenelon, Noah Dibert. Sitting (left to right): Cherie Loustaunau, Michael Kurtz
We are very grateful for all of Michael’s contributions, creativity, and boundless energy, and look forward to continued engagements beyond his tenure at the iSchool. Feel free to catch up with Michael over the summer at the Society of American Archives (SAA2018) Annual Conference:
-
- “Promoting Transparency in the Legacy of Slavery: Turning Data into People in Maryland’s Slave Records”, Panel on Aug. 18, 2018 downtown D.C. with Chris Haley, Ryan Cox, and Maya Davis. See: https://archives2018.sched.com/event/ESms/708-promoting-transparency-in-the-legacy-of-slavery-turning-data-into-people-in-marylands-slave-records
- “Community Engagement Workshop: Integrating Archival Education with Technology and Research”, on Aug. 15, 2018, at the UMD DCIC Center. See: https://archives2018.sched.com/event/EUFY/community-engagement-workshop-integrating-archival-education-with-technology-and-research
Michael not only taught at the University of Maryland’s College of Information Studies, for the last 18 years, but also became a full-time faculty member in 2011, and cofounded the DCIC Center in 2015 where he was the Associate Director until now. See:
-
- DCIC YouTube video at: https://youtu.be/LvVtlE1MB-w
- Partnerships in Advancing Digital Archival Education in the DCIC: https://saaers.wordpress.com/2018/03/06/partnerships-in-advancing-digital-archival-education/
Michael has been a tireless advocate and benefactor to the iSchool. He set up a 2012 bequest of $500,000 to establish the Michael J. Kurtz Professorship in Archives and Digital Curation, and in 2015 provided a second $500,000 bequest to create an endowment fund to support the DCIC Center’s efforts.
“In my life and career, the combination of education and archives has been very powerful, and my goal is to help expose students to the tools and technologies they are going to need for contemporary careers in archives.”
-
- Maryland’s iSchool Announces Kurtz Endowed Professorship: https://ischool.umd.edu/news/marylands-ischool-announces-kurtz-endowed-professorship
- History at a Click: New iSchool Gift Supports Center’s Digitization Efforts [Giving Newsletter: April 2016], https://issuu.com/umaryland/docs/gn16_apr_boldness (page 7)
Michael is also co-founder of the Computational Archival Science (CAS) initiative in the DCIC (with colleagues from Kings College London, Georgia Tech, University of British Columbia, and the Texas Advanced Computing Center). See: CAS Portal: https://ai-collaboratory.net/cas
He has led DCIC Student Project efforts on the Legacy of Slavery project, in partnership with the Maryland State Archives, and the International Research Portal Project, with records related to looted Nazi-Era art. See:
-
- Legacy of Slavery: https://ai-collaboratory.net/projects/legacy-of-slavery/
- IRP2: https://ai-collaboratory.net/projects/irp2
Prior to this he worked at the U.S. National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) for 37 years as a professional archivist, manager, and senior executive, including leading the National Declassification Center to streamline efforts to make billions of pages of government records public. His leadership was recognized by “Federal Computer Week” in 2005 with one of its prestigious Fed 100 Awards.
Michael received his doctoral degree in European History from Georgetown University in Washington, D.C. He has published extensively in the fields of American history and archival management. His broad and eclectic scholarly work, among others, include:
-
- “Museums, Archives, and Universities – Structuring Future Connections with Big Data” (co-author), in Big Data in the Arts and Humanities: Theory and Practice (June 2018). See: https://ai-collaboratory.net/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/Big_Data_in_the_Arts_and_Humanities_Theory_and_Practice-Ch.13.pdf
- “Archival Records and Training in the Age of Big Data” (co-author), in Re-Envisioning the MLS: Perspectives on the Future of Library and Information Science Education (May, 2018). See: https://ai-collaboratory.net/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/Marciano_Kurtz_et-al-Archival-Records-and-Training-in-the-Age-of-Big-Data-final-1.pdf
- “Archival Management and Administration,” in Encyclopedia of Library and Information Sciences (Third Edition, 2010)
- Managing Archival and Manuscript Repositories (2004)
- America and the Return of Nazi Contraband: The Recovery of Europe’s Cultural Treasures (2006, Paperback edition 2009).