We are delighted to present the six newly elected ICA members who will be contributing their energy and expertise to the Programme Commission (PCOM), the governance group for ICA’s professional programme. With the election of these members, the Programme Commission will constitute a group of archivists and records professionals from all four of ICA’s regions: Europe and North America, Asia and the Pacific, Africa and the Arab States, and Latin America and the Caribbean.
For the first time, PCOM will also include an indigenous archivist and will be introducing three new specialized seats on the Commission, as elected by current members of PCOM from among the nominees. The election of these new PCOM members was the result of the first full PCOM election under the recently revised ICA Constitution and Internal Regulations.
We invite you to read below their biographies to learn more about their professional experience, academic work and aims in this new role.
PCOM At-Large Members
Term: 2023 – 2026
Ryan Courchene, Canada
Ryan Courchene is an Indigenous person from Canada working as an Archivist with the Library and Archives Canada. He started his career with the Library and Archives Canada working as a clerk in 2002 and shortly after, in 2005, became an archival assistant. It was then that he realised that he wanted to be an archivist, which required a master’s degree. Only having a bachelor’s degree, a family, and working full time, this was not likely. It was after a decade of working that he made the decision to go back to university to get his master’s degree while still working full time. It was during this time as a graduate student that Ryan applied for, and received, the ICA New Professionals Programme Bursary. He was part of the cohort who attended and presented at the ICA Congress in Seoul Korea in 2016. Ryan recently obtained a joint master’s degree in History focusing on Archival Studies from the University of Manitoba and University of Winnipeg. He is currently employed in the Indigenous Initiatives section of the Library and Archives Canada, working on a special project to provide access and digitize Indigenous records in the LAC collection for Indigenous peoples across Canada.
Cristina Díaz Martínez, Spain
Cristina has a degree in Geography and History from the University Complutense of Madrid with specialisation in Latin American history. She also holds a master’s degree in Archival Sciences from the Universidad Carlos III de Madrid. She has worked in the Spanish Public Administration since 2002, mainly in the Spanish State Archives under the Ministry of Culture but also in the Archives of the Directorate General for Railways and Military Archives. She belongs since 2007 to the Senior Special Administration Body of Archivists, Librarians and Archaeologists. She is the manager of several archival projects like the Portal of Spanish Archives (PARES), the European Digital Treasures project or the AToM project, the latter two co-funded by the Creative Europe programme of the European Union. She is also a member of the European Commission expert groups European Archives Group, OMC group on the cultural dimension of sustainable development and Commission Expert Group on the common European Data Space for Cultural Heritage. In addition to her current position, Cristina is also since 2012 the Coordinator of the Technical Unit of the Cooperation Programme of the Ibero-American Summits of Heads of State and Government Iberarchivos. In the course of her work, Cristina has provided technical assistance in Latin America, particularly to archives in Mexico and Cuba. As well as being a Spanish civil servant, she is also an official of the European Union in the field of archives and document management and she worked in the Historical Archives of the European Parliament (Luxembourg). Finally, Cristina is the representative of the State Archives of Spain to the ICA, being a member of both EURBICA and the Latin American Archives Association (ALA).
Maximiliaan Scriwanek, Curaçao
Maximiliaan Scriwanek (Historian/Archivist) is Director of the National Archives of Curacao, Vice-President of the Caribbean Branch of the International Council on Archives (CARBICA) and co-chair of the Caribbean Heritage Emergency Network (CHEN). He chairs the National Committee of Blue Shield Curacao. In 2022, he was elected as Vice President of the Asociación de Historiadores Lationoamericanos y del Caribe (ADHILAC).
He is involved in setting up a Caribbean Hub as “cultural ambulance” for the region and training programs, locally and regionally. As a PCOM member, he hopes to help strengthen cooperation and communication and foster involvement between all professionals worldwide by keeping us well informed and encouraging international standards, best practices and innovative ideas.
Programme Liaison for ICA Training Programme
Term: 2023-2026
Jonathan Isip, Philippines
Jonathan Isip is a full-time archives faculty member in the University of the Philippines School of Library and Information Studies (UP SLIS) teaching undergraduate and graduate courses on archival theory, information organisation, records management, and digital preservation. They are one of the proponents behind the newly instituted Master in Archives and Records Management programme of the University in 2021.
Nathan also holds an administrative position as the Information Officer of the School. They work in partnership with the System Administrator to facilitate technology adoption and they advise on data privacy matters in the School, as well as manage social media engagement.
Nathan is also a records management consultant. As part of UP SLIS outreach and extension programme, they provide advice and training to Philippine and SEA institutions and individuals wishing to establish archives and records centres. They are also a regular trainer in an annual refresher course for information professionals and manage the extension programmes Moodle-based learning management system.
Programme Liaison for New Professionals Programme
Term: 2023 – 2026
Maria Papanikolaou, Germany
Maria Papanikolaou enjoys the combination of history and archives. She studied history at the University of Athens and obtained a master’s degree on Modern and Contemporary European and Greek History. Then, she continued to obtain a master’s in Archival Science at Leiden University where she gained a solid knowledge of archives and records management theory and practice. Since 2016, Maria has been working in archival and records management projects in national, academic and international organisations, such as the General State Archives of Greece, the ICC, the OPCW, the Europol. She currently holds the position of the Archivist and Records Manager at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Heidelberg, Germany.
Prior to EMBL, Maria was the Assistant University Archivist for Records Management at the American University in Cairo (AUC), 2018-2022. In 2019/2020, Maria was selected as a member of the ICA New Professionals Programme cohort. Since then, Maria has been continuously supporting ICA, thus firmly believing that a unified international community of archivists and records/information specialists is the driver for the sustainability, creative development, and future of our profession.
Early Career Representative
Term: 2023 – 2024
Elisabeth Klindworth, Germany
An archivist by profession, Elisabeth Klindworth works for the Archives of the Max Planck Society in Berlin, Germany. Currently, Elisabeth is working on the implementation of a digital long-term archive (OAIS), in which all archive-worthy documents of the Max Planck Society (file repositories, e-mails, databases, audiovisual media, etc.) can be preserved. In 2020, Elisabeth received a scholarship from the ICA New Professionals Programme. In her new role as Early Career Representative, she now wants to support PCOM in understanding the needs and perspectives of new professionals and in creating opportunities for community building and skills development.
Elisabeth holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in Archival Science and a Master of Arts degree in Information Science from the University of Applied Sciences Potsdam. Presently, she is especially interested in the topic areas of digital preservation, research data management, and the application of AI methods in the archives.