Discovering engaging stories: QUT Digital Collections evolving, preserving and describing cultural, heritage and institutional materials

This poster will visually display the digital collections developed and curated by Queensland University of Technology (QUT) Library and show examples of how through collaboration and stakeholder engagement with internal and external stakeholders these collections add value to both the QUT community and the wider community. We will be visually displaying the current 15 QUT Digital Collections to show the different stakeholder engagement and collaborations has occurred to this point. This is quite a bit of relevant literature which we can call upon to enhance the validity of the poster. Since 2012 QUT Library has developed and launched a number of digital collections. Over time there were a range of requests, that didn’t fit into our existing repository collections from both within the University and external donations that led to the decision to create QUT Digital Collections The collections curate and disseminate digitised and born-digital collections of QUT’s many predecessor institutional/local heritage materials other selected donated images and material and items that are used in various faculties for teaching and learning, primarily via open access. All the items from QUT digital collections can found via a Google search and are also indexed by Trove – National Library of Australia Curating and exhibiting digital collections of learning objects, cultural and/or institutional heritage materials significantly increases the value proposition of the institution’s investment in repository services. It is important to remember that digital collections are not static and need to be constantly added to and maintained to validate their existence. This poster will be able to be altered if new collections are added over time and will be used after the Off the Grid in presentations with audiences both internal and external to QUT