Western Archives Institute Information Session
Friday, March 13, 2026
10:00 a.m. – 10:30 a.m. (Pacific Standard Time)
Join the Western Archives Institute (WAI) Management Committee from 10:00am-10:30am PST on March 13th for an info session about the 2026 WAI program.
WAI is an intensive, two-week online program that offers integrated instruction in basic archival practices. It is designed for individuals with diverse professional goals, including those whose roles require a foundational understanding of archival skills but who have little or no prior archival training; those assuming increased responsibility for archival materials; practicing archivists without formal archival education; and individuals committed to pursuing a career in archives.
This info session will include a brief presentation on the 2026 program including details about program cost, the application process, participant selection criteria, and what to expect from the program. The session will then open up for a Q&A.
Speaker Bios:
Marcella Lees serves as WAI’s Administrator. She is the Digital Archivist at the Art Institute of Chicago where she works to manage and preserve digital records for the museum and school. She worked previously at Southern Illinois University Edwardsville as the Digital Archivist and Interim Director of Archives where she taught and consulted on undergraduate classes in archival processing, digital archives, and public history. She is involved with SAA as a member of the Digital Design Records Committee as well as more locally with the Chicago Collections Consortium and the Chicago Area Archivists. Prior to moving away from academic libraries, she played a very active role on the Archives Task Force for the Consortium of Academic and Research Libraries in Illinois developing archives webinars and resources for individuals getting started in archives. She received her MLIS from the University of Illinois Urbana Champaign and her Bachelors in History from Carleton College. Her research and outreach focuses on digital preservation, archives accessibility, disability advocacy, archives education, and historic data reuse.
Eric Milenkiewicz is the WAI Associate Administrator. He’s the Head of Special Collections & University Archives at California State University, San Bernardino where he oversees the library’s rare book and archival programs. His published works, focused on building indigenous digital collections and leveraging the Protocols for Native American Archival Materials, appear in The Public Historian, Journal of Western Archives, and Journal of Digital Media Management. For the past two decades he has worked in California archives, in both the UC and CSU systems, and served multiple terms on the Society of California Archivists Board, most recently as the President in 2020. He holds a Master of Library and Information Science from San José State University and a Bachelor of Arts in Psychology from UC Riverside.
Dana Reijerkerk is the WAI Online Program Coordinator. She is a Data Consultant, Freelance Digital Asset Manager, and FullStack Developer who works with nonprofits, archives, museums, libraries, and creatives to manage their IT systems, databases, websites, and media. Her published works on socio-technical issues in data appear in American Archivist, Cataloging & Classification Quarterly, DAM News, and Phil. Trans. B. Her community work with Indigenous peoples transcends several countries and spans from the east coast of the US to Madagascar and Japan. She’s the winner of the 2024 Society of American Archivists’ Fellows’ Ernst Posner Award and holds a Masters in Information and a Bachelors in American Indian Studies.
Sue Luftschein is President of the Society of California Archivists and serves on the WAI management committee as the SCA Board Liaison. Sue is currently Head of Special Collections in the USC Libraries. She received her MLIS from the University of California, Los Angeles, and a Ph.D. in Art History from the City University of New York Graduate Center. Prior to arriving at USC, she worked at the Huntington Library, and in the Institutional Records and Archives Department of the J. Paul Getty Trust. She has served on SCA’s Program, Local Arrangements, Publications, Nominating, and Western Archives Institute Management Committees, and was a Member-at-Large, 2020-2022. She is also currently a member of SAA’s Standards Committee; has served on SAA’s Technical Subcommittee for Describing Archives: A Content Standard (TS-DACS), of which she was co-chair 2019-2021; and was a member of the Encoded Archival Standards Section Steering Committee, 2019-2021. She was also a member of the OCLC Working Group on Collection Building and Operational Impact that produced the Total Cost of Stewardship report.
