The AAO’s Professional Development Committee presents Safe Spaces for Records Professionals with Disabilities, Chronic Illnesses, and the Neurodivergent

These virtual sessions are spaces intended and reserved for archivists and records managers with disabilities, chronic illnesses, or who are neurodivergent. No formal diagnosis is necessary, and no attendees are required to disclose anything. This space is for individuals in our profession to connect, support, and share their experiences with one another in an informal, participant-driven environment.

These sessions are open to students, emerging, and established professionals, as well as those working in volunteer and activist roles. Note that this space is only open to archives workers and records managers with visible and/or invisible disabilities. The AAO follows the ADA’s definition of disability as “a physical or mental impairment that substantially limits one or more major life activities.” Registrants who do not identify as records professionals with visible and/or invisible disabilities will be asked to leave or removed from the meeting.

Date: Thursday, October 5, 2023, 12:00 pm-1:00 pm EDT.

Location: Zoom (Link will be sent when registered)

Recording: These sessions will not be recorded.

Registration: FREE (AAO members, student members, and non-members)

Meetings are governed by the AAO’s Code of Conduct as well as a guideline of confidentiality. It is essential that all participants agree to keep confidential the identities of individual participants and any names that may be mentioned during their time together, as well as any attributed specific comments. Agreement about this point is required. 

About the moderator: 

Sarah McDougall has been a stutterer since early childhood and has experienced discrimination, accessibility barriers, and mental health challenges related to her disability. She is the Archives Assistant at the Anglican Diocese of Toronto Archives and the 2023-2024 President of the AAO. Sarah holds a Master of Information and a Master of Museum Studies from the University of Toronto's iSchool.

Please contact professionaldevelopment@aao-archivists.ca with your questions and any requests for accommodation.