NEWS & EVENTS

The end of an era28 September 2009

The UK Data Archive is saddened to announce the retirement of two of its longest serving members of staff, Ken and Pam Miller. Between them the Millers rack up more years of service than the Archive has been in existence!

Ken was the first to join the Archive in 1985, entering in the post of Applications Programmer. Ken and Pam imageOver the years he worked his way up through the Archive serving as Technical and Metadata Specialist and Information Development Officer before becoming Associate Director, Head of Information Development and Programming in 2002. Ken was very active in the international data archiving community, sitting on metadata and information development expert committees for CESSDA and the DDI Alliance among others. Ken is responsible for moving the Archive into the web age and for the development of its now standard-setting data catalogue. He is a pioneer in the development of electronic thesauri and headed the Multilingual Access to Data Infrastructures of the European Research Area (MADIERA) project to develop the European Language Social Science Thesaurus (ELSST), Europe’s only multilingual social science electronic thesaurus. His popularity as a public speaker was legendary, winning the most entertaining talk accolade at the annual International Association of Social Science Information Services and Technology (IASSIST) conference for most of the years of his attendance.

Pam likewise is an internationally respected expert in social science metadata. Under her watchful eye, the UK Data Archive‘s data catalogue and thesaurus were developed into world class tools and maintained to enviably high standards. Pam was a key player in developing the modern web-based services we now take for granted, and ably oversaw the Archive’s web development group for many years. “Pam will know” has been the perennial answer to many questions Archive staff ask each other, and the wealth of her knowledge will be sorely missed.

Ken and Pam are fully embracing their retirement and looking forward to having time to spend on their allotment, going to music festivals and Pam will be pursuing her new career as an Integrative Counsellor while Ken will be improving his backhand.



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