Information is the key to the furtherment of humanity and is what enriches the human
experience. Providing access to information has been a lifelong goal of mine. Growing up, the one
institution that held my trust was the library. It has always remained a beacon of refuge and a place of
solace since I can remember. My unyielding love of the library is what guided my decision to pursue a
career in Library and Information science. Throughout the course of my education it became clear to me that studying the past was important in changing the future. This realization led me to my first
volunteering opportunity at an archive. Working at the archive provided a place to push my curiosity
and explore the power of the past. Harnessing what I learned there allowed me to develop deeper
comprehension around the difficult questions I asked. Questions I could not solve without the
insightfulness of the past. It is from this experience that I grasped the true power that lies within
maintaining and preserving vital records.

     

     Working on my Master’s Degree, at the University of Texas iSchool provided me with the opportunity to expand on my knowledge of records. It is here that I realized that even records possess a lifecycle. I was lucky enough to secure an internship with the Records Management depart at the University of Texas. This internship showed me how records are created, maintained, and when it is time are disposed of. I learned that laws and policies govern how, why, and when this occurs. I was introduced to the delicacy of this process and just how difficult it can be to ensure that records are maintained properly across such a large organization. What I realized is that it takes extreme communication efforts to ensure that this process is taken seriously and routinely performed. Documentation of all the ways records should be handled and accessed is vital to assure they are being maintained correctly.

     

     My next employment opportunity landed me at the Texas Department of Transportation. Here I was able to expand on working with aspects of communication and knowledge management. My time there revealed that within this organization a large percentage of their employees are eligible to retire, and when they leave will take decades of institutional knowledge with them. This potential knowledge gap is what sparked my Capstone Project. I wanted to develop a way to capture this rich knowledge and provide a repository where future or current employees could access these “records” to ensure that TxDOT operations continue to run effectively and efficiently. The knowledge management program I developed utilizes many tools, as everyone learns differently, to achieve knowledge transfer successfully. The program is in its infancy, but I believe with continued adoption it will mature into a useful addition with in TxDOT’s Right of Way Division.