Jennifer Cwiok

Jen Cwiok works as the Digital Systems Librarian at the American Museum of Natural History Gottesman Research Library. She is primarily responsible for the Museum’s institution-wide Digital Asset Management System, as well as the Library’s technical infrastructure, which entails managing various community supported open-source applications and providing technical support to Library staff.

Jen co-teaches two classes at Pratt Institute School of Information with her AMNH colleague, Iris Lee: Museum Information Management: Collection Cataloging & Digital Technology and Knowledge Organization. Jen has more than 20 years of experience in the library and information sector, specializing in cataloging, metadata, taxonomy, digital asset management, and systems administration. She is passionate about sharing her real world experiences with her students and applying what she learns through teaching to her work at AMNH. Jen also presents regularly at conferences and writes about metadata, taxonomy and digital asset management. 

Before coming to the American Museum of Natural History, Jen worked on metadata and digital asset management projects on behalf of a small mom and pop company, The Granger Collection, which licensed historical stock imagery, as well as large companies like Lazard Ltd, Marvel Entertainment, and Condé Nast Fairchild. She started her information career as a monographic and serials copy cataloger at the University of Georgia Library. In 2003, Jen moved to New York City to pursue a graduate degree in Library and Information Science at the Palmer School of Information and Library Science, Long Island University where she graduated in 2004.  

BA English Literature, University of Georgia
MLIS, Long Island University, Palmer School of Library and Information Science

Meyer, K., & Cwiok, J. (2022, January 11). The evolving archive: How born-digital assets and AI are changing the landscape for the AMNH Research Library. LinkedIn.

Cwiok, J. (2021, January 6). From hot links to Linked Data. American Museum of Natural History.

Cwiok, J. & Lee, I. (2020). “Paving the way: The American of Natural History Research Library’s road to digital asset management.” Journal of Digital Media Management, © Henry Stewart Publications 2047-1300 (2020) Vol. 8, 4 1–14.

Cwiok, J. (2005). “The Defining Element – A Discussion of the Creator Element Within Metadata Schemas.” Metadata: A Cataloger’s Primer. Ed. Richard P. Smiraglia. Binghamton, N.Y.: Haworth, 2005. (Published simultaneously as Cataloging & Classification Quarterly, vol. 40, nos. 3/4, 2005).