OLD TOWN SCHOOL OF FOLK MUSIC

IMLS Grant Proposal for the

Old Town School of Folk Music Archive
Kamallah Kaplan
LIS 759 01
Submitted on
April, 30, 2016

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Background
The OTSFM, established in 1957, was founded on the premise that music should be accessible to
everyone. The founders of OTSFM, Win Stracke, Dawn Greening, and Frank Hamilton (folk
musicians themselves), believed that bypassing formal music education and using oral and folk
teaching methods would develop communal participation and aural skills. The foundation of
OFTSMs progressive music pedagogy reflected the founders involvement in pressing social
issues of the time and a budding folk music revival of the mid-20th century.
Studs Terkel, an iconic figure in Chicago, was involved in many OTSFM projects, and a
recipient of a Pulitzer Price for his nonfiction work, The Good War: An Oral History of World
War II. Of note is his narration for a folk music revue, I Come for to Sing, which had great
success as a touring music program in the early 1950s, and was the notable meeting place where
the founders of OTSFM and Terkel met each other. The school would also later publish a folk
magazine by the same name during the time period 1975 1987. The relationship between
Stracke, Hamilton, Greening, and Terkel would contribute to both the founders and Terkels
future projects and their impact on cultural projects and social issues in Chicago. These
noteworthy collaborations between Terkel and the founders would inspire Stracke to create the
OTSFM. To establish a contextual understanding of Terkels relationship with the OTSFM and
its founders, a video of Terkel discussing the birth of the OTSFM here will provide a deeper
understanding of their dynamic relationship and how the OTSFM was established.
The formation of the OTSFM contributed greatly to Chicagos community, providing a shared
space for its citizens to gather together to share their diverse American stories and culture
through music. The OTSFM has enriched its community for over 60 years, hosting community
events and creating community outreach programs for underserved communities in Chicago.
Currently, the OTSFM provides music lessons to 6600 students per week. Enrollment of students
continues to grow and the schools performance venue unceasingly provides musicians
opportunities to perform and refine their skill set. As part of its strategic plan, the OTSFM
intends to embrace its role as a major advocate for folk culture. The following link
https://www.oldtownschool.org/media/doc/StrategicPlan.pdf will provide documentation of the
OTSFMs mission and strategic plan.
Statement of Need
The proposed project intends to make the OTSFM photo and audio collections available to a
global audience to include music scholars, historians, ethnomusicologist, and the public at large.
As it stands now, the OTSFM is an underserved archive with limited resources. In particular, the
archive is operating with high-barrier and low quality metadata. Part of the challenge is that the
OTSFM does not have the skill set, sophisticated equipment, and appropriate number of staff to
create quality metadata for its photo and audio collections. Nor does the OTSFM have the
financial resources to market the archive and create a functional institutional repository.

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Additionally, the OTSFM has not implemented a long-term preservation strategy for future
changes in technology services or for the potential obsolescence of technology. For example, the
OTSFM has been uploading its photos to Googles Picasa Web service, which was shuttered in
March, 2016. It is no longer feasible for archives to rely on current technology for preservation.
At the rapid rate that technology continues to change and introduce new services, momentous
consideration needs to be given to the OTSFMs current and future digital preservation strategy.
The proposed project and collaboration between OTSFM and the Studs Terkel Archive (STA)
would foster the improvement of the above disparities and establish an institutional repository
that could disseminate its resources to a global audience. Collaborations between institutional
repositories are not only enhancing opportunities for disseminating and sharing information
between institutional repositories, they are also creating partnerships that greatly enhance
opportunities for institutional repositories to promote and enhance their collections within a
broader and more symbiotic confluence of partnerships. Some examples of these types of
collaborations have been observed in institutional repositories, like Indiana Universitys Sound
Directions archive, which successfully built a collaborative partnership with Harvard University
and the Archive of World Music to develop emerging standards for digital preservation. For
more information about this project, the link here will provide documentation of their grant
proposal, which was successfully funded by IMLS.
Furthermore, the confluence of the OTSFM and STA will merge related resources that
collectively build on their respective collections and improve the understanding of the context of
the relationship between the OTSFM and Terkels contributions to the school over the years.
OTSFMs collection of sound recordings and photos documenting its music performances
enhance STAs collection of Terkels recorded radio shows on WFTM. Similarly, the STA
documents interviews with folk musicians who frequently performed at OTSFM. These
interviews also provide insight into the zeitgeist of music, politics, and the spirit of the times as
they shifted and changed over the last 50 years. It is evident that these two archives are not only
compatible, they share a rich and overlapping history that would be enhanced by the goals
defined in this grant proposal.
Impact
The influence that music has had on culture, social causes, and the personal satisfaction one
experiences in listening to and playing music are incredibly poignant, enriching the life of both
the fan of music and the musician. The OTSFMs progressive music pedagogy is substantial in
that its paradigm for teaching music promotes personal satisfaction and creativity, reflects a
communal awareness of social engagement with and responsibility to society, and challenges the
status quo. As folk music started out as a way for communities to share and disseminate their
culture and stories through song, so, too, has OTSFMs mission to create a space where learning
is communal by interacting and engaging within a shared space.

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Folk music is what the people sing and was often referred to as peasant music, that is, music
that reflected the hardships of underserved communities. History is often written by those in
positions of power, or from the perspective of individuals who have not experienced the
hardships faced by those who live in poverty, have limited resources, or have been denied their
civil rights. Collectively, history should reflect the voices of all communities, not just those who
have been privileged by wealth and education. By augmenting the OTSFM archive with the
development of an institutional repository and quality interoperable metadata this project would
allow these voices to be heard. It would also allow researchers, in particular music scholars,
historians, and ethnomusicologists, an opportunity to enhance their research, providing a broader
and potentially more critical and thoughtful examination of history. The audience would also
include the public at large, musicians, fans of music, or those who are simply curious about folk
music, Studs Terkel, or any topics related to these archives.
The OTSFMs mission to enhance culture and civic engagement through music has enriched the
lives of fans of music, musicians, and its community. Without the development of the
institutional repository proposed in this project, the stories of folk music and those who have
supported the effort of the OTSFMs founders, as well as its stories and history will remain in an
information silo. To paraphrase what Studs Terkel once said, on behalf of the OTSFM, If you
dont know the songs, you dont know your history.
Project Design
Goals
As previously noted above, the proposed project is a collaboration between the OTSFM and the
Chicago History Museums STA. Both OTSFM and STA share a common interest in Terkels
civic engagement in the city of Chicago, his relationship and contributions to the OTSFM, and
the preservation of folk music. The OTFSMs photo archive of 20,000 photos and printed
materials, and 4,000 sound recordings is currently underserved and lacking quality and
interoperable metadata. Exposure to this archive has a high-barrier interoperability for three
reasons 1) lack of quality and interoperable metadata 2) lack of expertise in creating metadata 3)
its marketing department will not allocate monies for marketing its online presence.
This project would support low-barrier metadata that would be shared between OTSFM and STA
and improve intellectual access to this resource, as well as appeal to a broader audience.
The intention of this project is to accomplish the following goals over a three-year period:
1) Create quality and low-barrier interoperable metadata by establishing a standard
schema, preferably Dublin Core, and OAI-PMH standards for metadata harvesting.
Augment the photo archive with interoperable and linked data shared between
OTSFMs music archive and the Studs Terkel Archive.
2) Collaborate with an existing archive, i.e. the Studs Terkel Archive, which shares a
similar interest in documenting Studs Terkels civic engagement in the city of
Chicago and the preservation of folk music.

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3) Provide an actively (rather than passive) engaging resource for a broader audience
that would include students, musicians, musicologists, scholars, and the public at
large.
4) Develop a budget and team to improving intellectual access to OTSFM archive.
5) Develop a long-term digital preservation strategy for the OTSFM.
6) Provide the OTSFMs archival manager with professional instruction on how to
create quality and interoperable metadata for the OTSFM archive so that preservation
of future photos and printed materials can preserved for prosperity.
Technical Specifications
At the onset of this project the digitization of the OTSFMs collection of photos will need to be
completed. Currently 10,000 photos and printed materials have been digitized, though the
remainder of photos and printed materials in this collection will need to be archived in a
digitized format. Those photos that have been archived have been done so following best
practices for digitized objects. The remaining photos and printed materials will be digitized in a
respective master archive file and will be created in a TIFF format. Derivatives of the master
files will be formatted as JPEGS and JPEG thumbnails. To ensure the fixity of the respective
master archive files their fixedness will be checked using MDM5 checksum.
While the photos and printed materials in this collection need to be digitized, master archive files
and derivatives for the 4,000 sound recordings have already been established. The OTSFM
received a grant from the Donnelley Foundation in 2010, which provided funding for
professional digital conversion of these recordings. Every effort was made to ensure that the
context of these concerts have been preserved in their unaltered state. The master files were
formatted in Broadcast Wave Format (BWF) and a unique source identifier has been created for
each master file.
Metadata
In order to ensure that the digital objects in this collection can be disseminated, interoperable
metadata will need to be created for dissemination and sharing between the collaborating
organizations. Libraries and archives are moving towards marketing their collections through
metadata created in XML schemas. As noted in this proposal, it is particularly important for the
OTSFM to be able to disseminate and market its archive. The effort put into creating metadata in
an XML schema, like Dublin Core, will not only produce quality metadata, it will also create
opportunities to expose the OTSFM to a broader audience. The project manager and contributing
staff agree that Dublin Core is the appropriate metadata schema for this collection. Metadata will
follow the standards outlined by METS and will be supported by a skilled metadata librarian
currently on staff at the STA.
The metadata librarian will be responsible for establishing metadata creation during the time
allocated for this project. The metadata librarian will also be responsible for professional training
of the archive manager and archive assistant at the OTSFM. Providing professional metadata
creation training will ensure that the OTSFM will be able to continue to create Dublin Core
records once the project is completed.

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Software and Storage

The OTSFM will be using the software program, CONTENTdm, to catalog and store the digital
objects in this collection. The project team feels that CONTENTdm is the most appropriate
software for this project, as it easily accommodates a variety of formats, in particular images,
text, and audio files. It also has built in features that allow for metadata to be integrated with
World Cat and OAI-MPH and XML metadata schemas. This software package is easily
downloaded and can be modified to meet the needs of this project, though an interface developer,
repository developer, and programmer will be needed to produce the desired aesthetics and
features for the user interface.
As a part of the long-term digital preservation strategy, which will be discussed in the
sustainability section, backup storage will be included as a security measure for preservation of
the digital objects in this institutional repository; however, it will not be necessary to purchase
backup storage, as CONTENTdm includes incremental backup for every file. For a small archive
with limited resources, like the OTSFM, solidifying storage into one package will streamline the
workflow and eliminate the need for additional third party services.
Intellectual Access
One of the main goals of this project is to create a global audience for this archive. Users of the
OTSFM digital collection will be able to access it through a website with interoperable metadata
that will be harvested through OAI MPH and accessible to World Cat and STA. Access points
will be easy to locate and streamlined for navigation and search behaviors based on user studies
conducted during this project. Subject analysis will be applied to the descriptive metadata,
subject headings, and controlled vocabulary. Subject headings will utilize Congress Subject
Headings, Library of Congress Medium of Performance Thesaurus for Music, and the Art and
Architecture Thesaurus.
Web Design
The website will be developed based on user study models produced in similar projects and from
the information gathered in the user-centered studies for this project. It is important that the user
experience is streamlined to meet the needs of 21st Century users. Thoughtful consideration of
integrating user behavior will be applied to its design, such as mobile phone interfaces that are
configured for an optimal user experience and OCR features that are built into CONTENTdm.
The interface developer will provide support, as needed, to optimize the users experience.
Gathering User Input
User input will be gathered from staff, scholars, end users, and the public. User experience
studies will be evaluated through the prototype interface developed for this project. In addition to
user studies, a feedback channel will be generated for users to leave comments about their
experience. The Google integration analytics provided by CONTENTdm will also be used to
generate metrics about users search behavior.

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Resolution of Intellectual Property Rights

The OTSFM collection of photos, printed materials, and sound recordings are considered
workmade for hire. The OTSFM owns the copyright to these materials and is the legal creator of
these works. Legal agreements have been established between the employer (OTSFM) and the
employee(s) of the OTSFM. Because this archive intends to make small sections of concerts
available online, the legal contracts include a clause that allows for redistribution of the work
made for hire. The term of copyright protection of a work made for hire is 95 years from the date
of publication or 120 years from the date of creation, whichever expires first. For a more detailed
explanation of this type of copyright, please visit the US Copyright Office here
http://www.copyright.gov/circs/circ09.pdf
Plan for evaluation of project
Evaluation of the project will be done by summative and formative methods. The summative
evaluation will be observed and gauged through project management meetings. The project
manager will retrieve information from team members about its findings, innovations, and
challenges during the project and produce progress reports of its findings. The formative method
will be done through the creation of a final report that will be disseminated at IMLS conferences
and other relative conferences that support current and emerging digital library practices.
Project Resources
Staff
This project will employ staff from the STA and OTSFM; however, about 80% of the staff from
the STA will be utilized with the remaining 20% coming from the OTSFM. From the STA, 10
full-time staff will be hired for this project and two full-time staff will be hired from the OTSFM.
Part-time staff will include six graduate students from Dominican University and one part-time
programmer.
Project Manager: Kamallah Kaplan, OTSFM, .30 FTE
Kamallah Kaplan will be working with all staff to ensure that this project is completed efficiently
and on time. She will be conducting quarterly meetings with staff members to maintain and
manage communication with team members during the project.
Archive Manager: Lena Dunham, OTSFM, .35 FTE
Lena Dunham will support the project manager and work directly with the metadata librarian on
developing the descriptive metadata. She will also provide information about the history and
context of OTSFM to support the descriptive metadata.
Archive Assistant: Marilynne Robinson, OTSFM, .30 FTE
Marilynne Robinson will work with the archive manager and metadata librarian in developing
and implementing special projects including image/document database development (scanning,
loading files to repositories, metadata work, etc.) and other ad hoc projects. She will also be a
liaison with staff members and when necessary will assist with ad hoc tasks/projects.

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Director of Digital Library Services: Tina Fey, STA, .35 FTE

Tina Fey will provide strategic direction for the development of the OTSFMs digital and
technology initiatives. She will also provide direction and expertise in digital library
applications, including web development, emerging technologies and initiatives to help the
OTSFM innovate through technology, ensuring that virtual services are effectively and
appropriately integrated with onsite services.
Metadata Librarian: Gloria Steinem .35 FTE
Gloria Steinem will focus on the creation, maintenance, and enrichment of metadata representing
OTSFMs digital collection. She will also provide expertise in the development, implementation
and assessment of metadata policies and procedures to OTSFM. Additionally, the metadata
librarian will also be training the archive manager and archive assistant on how to create Dublin
Core records.
Digitizing Lab Manager: Joan Didion, .20 FTE
Joan Didion will consult on technical problems and devise solutions, as well as seek out methods
for new and better functionality. She will also research into improved methods of delivery and
preservation.
Digitizing Supervisor: Betty Friedan, .15 FTE
Betty Friedan will supervising and assign the staff with their daily task of ingest, preparing
schedules, plans, monitoring and ensuring the proper workflow of digitizing the materials.
Systems Administrator: Elizabeth Blackwell, .25 FTE
Elizabeth Blackwell will be responsible for effective provisioning, installation/configuration,
operation, and maintenance of systems hardware and software and related infrastructure.
Technology Director: Alice Paul, .20 FTE
Alice Paul will responsible for establishing plans and overall policies for the technological
infrastructure of the OTSFM institutional repository.
Interface Developer: Susan B. Anthony, .15 FTE
Susan B. Anthony will be responsible for implementing designs into both student and stafffacing web applications.
Repository Developer: Lucy Stone, .20 FTE
Lucy Stone will consult on the management and support of the repositorys content, as well as
development of support for new and better functionality.
Programmer, Maya Angelou, .67 FTE
Maya Angelou be responsible for database and software design and will assist with the
configuration, maintenance, testing and troubleshooting of CONTENTdm.

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Budget
The projects budget will support the creation of goals defined in this proposal, i.e., creation and
development of interoperable metadata, professional metadata instruction, the dissemination of
this collection to a global audience, the improvement of intellectual access, and development of a
long-term digital preservation strategy. The total costs for this project are $1,072,094. The IMLS
cost share is $533,321 or exactly 49.75%. The OTSFMs total project costs are $538,773.
Equipment and Hardware
Scanning will take up a large portion of this project and will be executed in the first year of this
project. Funding from this project will secure sophisticated scanning equipment, i.e., the Epson
Perfection V800, which will produce high-resolution photos, slides, and text. Two scanners will
be required for the volume of photos and slides that need to be digitized for this archive. In order
to accommodate a productive and efficient scanning process, two work stations will be set up for
a streamlined work flow. Two additional computers will be purchased for these workstations to
help expedite the scanning process.
Communications
Conferences
A large part of communicating the results and findings of this project will be done through its
promotion at conferences. The Project Manager, Kamallah Kaplan, will present the projects
report at IMLS sponsored conferences and the Joint Conference on Digital Libraries.
Publication
In addition to the project report developed by the project manager, a booklet will be created to
instruct small archives, with very limited resources, on how to successfully develop a grant
proposal, collaborate with other organizations, and develop a long term digital preservation
strategy. The booklet will be published in Open Access journals that focus on digital library
literature.
Video
The Project Manager, Kamallah Kaplan, has secured the support of undergraduate film students
to assist in documenting this project. The undergraduate students have offered to volunteer their
time and knowledge of video production, free of charge, as part of their thesis project. The video
will be used to promote the OTSFM as a model for similar archives in need of project funding.
Project Website
In addition to disseminating the projects findings through Open Access publishing and digital
library conferences, the OTSFM website will be used to promote its project report, booklet, and
video of the project. The website will also include a feedback channel for comments or questions
about the OTSFM grant project.

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Sustainability
A digital preservation strategy will be developed to ensure that the digital objects in this
collection will continue to be preserved as technology services change or become obsolete. This
is extremely important for digital archives as the context and authenticity of digital objects could
be compromised as a result of obsolete software, hardware, or from lack of contextual
knowledge of how to operate outdated software/hardware. An example of this kind of loss was
documented in the famous 1976 Viking Mars Landing in which the context of raw data
disappeared as a consequence of defunct software. As part of this projects digital preservation
strategy, the OASIS model will be established as a standard for the OTSFMs long-term digital
preservation strategies.
Additionally, after the completion of this project, the OTSFM will be seen as a leader in digital
stewardship. The marketing and promotion materials developed for this project will continue to
enhance the OTSFMs digital stewardship and offer insight for other archives that wish to
propose similar projects.

Conclusion
This project, once completed, will support the preservation of folk music, its voices, its stories,
and the culture of diverse American communities. The contributing staff members feel strongly
that the goals of this project are well defined and will complement the existing audio archive and
the STA, as well as expand its audience to a global level. As libraries and archives move further
into the digital frontier, the Semantic Web and XML platforms allow digital libraries to market
and disseminate their collections in more meaningful and impactful ways than ever before. The
team members of this project see the development of the OTSFM into an institutional repository
as an opportunity to promote digital stewardship and test emerging practices in digital libraries.

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Budget Narrative
The total costs for this project are $1,072,094. The IMLS cost share is $533,321 or exactly
49.75% and the OTSFMs total project costs are $538,773.
Year One
Total IMLS Cost $256, 859
Total Library Cost Share: $305,542
Total Cost: $562,401
Year Two
Total IMLS Cost $139,172
Total Library Cost Share: $118,931
Total Cost: $258,102
Year Three
Total IMLS Cost $137,291
Total Library Cost Share: $114,300
Total Cost: $251,591
Totals (Year 1, Year 2, and Year 3)
Total IMLS Cost: $533,321
Library Cost Share: $538,773
Total Cost: $1,072, 094
Work Flow
Year One
The first year will be devoted to scanning photos and printed materials, downloading and setting
up the software system CONTENTdm, and migrating the existing photo collection and sound
recordings. Quarterly project management meetings will occur throughout the first year.
Second Year
The second year will focus on creating metadata for the photo collection and sound recordings,
which will begin in October and be completed in June. Professional metadata instruction will
overlap with metadata creation, as this will be an efficient use of time and an excellent way to
demonstrate how to create Dublin Core records.
The interface developer will begin development of the prototype for the user interface in
February and complete this task in June. In July the programmer will begin working on the
database and software design and will assist with the configuration, maintenance, testing and
troubleshooting of CONTENTdm. Quarterly project management meetings will occur
throughout the second year.

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Third Year
In the third year the interface developer will begin rolling out the prototype interface in October.
User experience studies will be conducted from October through January to gain insight into
users search behavior. Market materials will be prepared and organized for the website and
dissemination at IMLS sponsored conferences. From June through July the project manager will
disseminate the project report, booklet, and video at IMLS conferences and the Joint Conference
on Digital Libraries. Quarterly project management meetings will occur throughout the third
year.

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