Archives? Career/ courses

[TheLivelyRose]

Asking for a friend.

Daughter has a MFL degree. Is really interested in historical archives. He did a small amount of volunteering over the summer after uni. She's considering a career in it however from what she can see there's little money in it. The drops available appear to be part time, and even the full time ones don't pay much money even for experienced archivists.

Money isn't the only consideration. Career satisfaction is important but one has to consider that you seem to need a post graduate in this.

She'd be paying £££ for an MA or PgDip and if the salaries are low then it's maybe not worth it.

Any idea and it does only one have any experience or know.If this type of career is completely saturated. Enjoying your job is one thing, but if there's no money in it or very few jobs, then it's going to impact on your life and waste several years, and that's what she's thinking about.

I don't know Im afraid about careers fairs I haven't asked.

MFL is a perfectly good first degree for archives. History may be the most common first degree but I know people who have successfully got into archives after studying languages, English, classics, archaeology, law, even a science.

Try and get some volunteering experience first, contact every archive nearby to see if there are any openings. Then ideally an archive assistant role may come up somewhere

There are some distance learning courses you can do while earning.

In terms of jobs, you do have to be prepared to move around, especially early career.

She could look at volunteering opportunities in libraries' local studies departments and in local history societies.

A quick check reveals my local family history society is looking for volunteers to do transcribing/scanning etc. That would be relevant.

Also there is still a tendency to think that libraries/museums/archives jobs are about paper and objects but these are all people jobs as well. Your archivist will often be working on a public desk making people feel welcome and helping them to use the resources, they'll be organising events and displays, welcoming school children on class visits.

So any sort of volunteering in museums etc will be useful for building these skills even if it doesn't seem directly relevant.

Hi
Speaking first hand as someone who actually did the MA in Archives and works in sector

There are paid traineeship available for pre-course experience that usually last 1 year with the expectation such as this one
https://www.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/about/jobs/trainee-digital-archivist

Depending whereabouts in the country she lives/ would go to.

The traineeship can be competitive so volunteering at least a few days a month at an archive would help

In terms of career-there is more variety than mentioned in some posts- local records offices/ banks/ government ( for example records reviewers)/ museums/ private families ( Rothschild is one). Plus there is opportunity for digital archiving, information management and i am also picking up AI Governance as the skills of interpretation etc pretty useful

In terms of salary. I am Senior and earn £80k. Because I didn't mind moving into information roles more widely

There are also apprenticeship options but they are fairly new but give same level qualifications
https://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/careers-in-archives/archivist-and-records-manager-apprenticeships/become-an-apprentice/

Hope that helps

Really helpful thank you @YourMerryNavyDreamer2 . I have a DD also considering this field. Interesting that the Bodleian link mentions social sciences as under represented alongside stem.

It's not just universities and local councils that employ archivists. Big multinationals et Shell employ archivists, and I know that the big Scottish whisky company Chivas, part of the Pernod Ricard group, have an archivists for their whisky arm. With a MFL degree there might be openings in international beverage companies, including perhaps big eg French wines and spirits companies, if French is one of your YP's languages.
A friend with an English degree is an archivist. She did her archives Masters at Liverpool.

I am a qualified archivist who used to work in a county archive, though I am now retired. You have already been given very good information by @YourMerryNavyDreamer2 and @Plumpciousness. An option I don't think has been mentioned is that two universities, Aberwystwyth and Dundee, offer online postgraduate archives and records management courses. They do require students to be spending at least part of each week in an archive, either employed or as a volunteer, but it is possible to do this while working elsewhere (though full time might be pushing it!)

I’ve worked in corporate libraries all my career, mainly law and earned far more than a high street lawyer but nothing compared to the law firm Partners. Not archives per se but very interesting, managing research teams, libraries and intranet infrastructure.

A lot of the corporate records management is automated with someone overseeing the software solution that may or may not have an archivist background. Do also consider library science MAs, lots of transferable skills and in demand with AI connectivity etc.

I have a DC who completed a Masters in History and is now in the civil service working at the National Archives in Kew. She rather stumbled on the work and enjoys it. The degree has no direct relevance to the work she does there, other than the analytical skills she picked up whilst studying. The National Archives is frequently in the news. There’s more to her work than cataloging and filing. Worth looking closely at what goes on there.