Teaching Social Media: #Charleston Syllabus What to Read to Understand

 Interim President Dr. Brown invited me to accompany him and present the Charleston Syllabus at the Third District Planning Meeting of the A.M.E Church, Columbus, Ohio on November 6, 2015. #CharlestonSyllabus is a project I introduced to the Payne Community via library exhibit (see pictures below). Dr. Brown included me to use the syllabus to provide resources for the clery to address issues of violence in the African American community. That instruction did not sit well with me because it without nuance, it would see we were talking about Black on Black crime. Thus my presentation to upwards of 150 ordained clergy, instead addressed issues of race-motivated violence against the African American community. 

My one-hour presentation analyzed how social media is used as a tool in the new academy, the origins of crowdsourced syllabi projects like the #CharlestonSyllabus and #BlackChurchSyllabus, and explored strategies for using these booklists for Christian Education in the local church. I also shared also free resources for online Bible Studies. Using the storylinking model in Anne Wimberly's Soul Stories: African American Christian Education I demonstrated how to incorporate social media in Christian Education and reach out to parishioners in new ways.

I began with an overview of the pitfalls and opportunities presented by social media, then went into a demonstration of how to use all the functions of Twitter using my own account to "Tweet" to Dr. Brown. Then I gave a history of the development of crowdsourced syllabi projects from #Ferguson,t he catalyst of what can be called the “syllabi movement”, is a collection of resources for teachers from kindergarten to higher education on teaching, understanding, and remembering civic unrest and social activism to #Charleston and how scholars are using Twitter to connect. Next, I asked those present to reflect on where they were in they heard news of the massacre at Mother Emmanuel and shared my own experience at ATLA in June. I segued into a discussion about the radically inclusive nature of Twitter, the founding of #Blacklivesmatter by three queer identifying Black women and the what the church must consider if it is to be relevant and participate in online conversations with millenials using Rahiel Tesfamariam September 18th Washington Post article "Why the modern civil rights movement keeps religious leaders at arm’s length" critiquing the Black Church

 Next we went through Anne Streaty Wimberley’s four phase story linking process, explored the special considerations made for hosting online bible studies and experimented with finding cultural competent Biblical images in theVanderbilt Divinity School’s Art in the Christian Tradition. I also highlighted Workingpreacher.com, The Thoughts Room, Campaign Zero, and Mapping Police Violence in my Google Hangout/Google Docs hosted Bible Study that used images, video (Youtube), and a selection from Ida B. Wells-Barnett’s 1895, work A Red Record: Alleged Causes of Lynching featured on the Charleston Syllabus.

A bit of context for the Bible Study piece: I knew I wanted this study to reflect on the mourning mothers of children victimized by police brutality so I built on the story of my sorority sister Sandra Bland as the everyday story. Sandra Bland who was found hanged in a jail cell in Waller County, Texas, on July 13, 2015 after being pulled over for a minor traffic violation on July 10 by state trooper. My biblical text is John 19:25-27 when Jesus tells his beloved disciple to watch over his mother from the cross. Mary’s child son is in trouble -- arrested, unfairly tried, condemned, and now dying, but she is there and Jesus gives her back to his beloved disciple to the church to deal with, to mourn with, and to love on. The African American heritage story is a selection from the Ida B. Wells-Barnett’s 1895, work A Red Record: Alleged Causes of Lynching featured on the Charleston Syllabus.

The presentation was very well received and I was invited to do a similar presentation in January 2016 at a local A.M.E. Church that is revamping its Christian Education program.

                               

"Church and Social Media" page based on my presentation on Payne Library page

At the beginning of my presentation

Ciana Ayenu, archival intern designing the display

I clearly had the rapt attention of Dr. Brown and Bishop McKinley-Young 

A Whole New World: Digital Libraries Federation Forum- Vancouver, B.C.

Earlier this Summer I was awarded one of four 2015 ARL (Association of Research Libraries) + DLF (Digital Library Federation) Forum Underrepresented Groups Fellow, travel grants to attend Digital Library Forum conference in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, October 26-28, 2015.

Slides on "Nigger White House" From Dr. Noble's Lecture

 The Digital Library Federation Annual Meeting provided multiple opportunities to dialogue with a variety of digital libraries colleagues about born-digital preservation, linked data, and authority control. I was pleased to notice the conference’s attentiveness to race and gender as these intersections  touched every part of the forum design from the registration table featuring inviting attendees to select appropriate gender pronoun stickers, to the welcome from Larry Grant, elder of the Musqueam  First Nation during the opening plenary. 

My favorite dialogue of the forum was Dr. Safiya Noble’s talk which centered on Google algorithms and how our metadata is not neutral. She used recent examples from social media including the White House Googlemaps Incident uncovered by #Blacklivesmatter and #Ferguson organizer Deray McKesson (see pictures attached). Dr. Noble began her talk providing books and scholars which grounded her work and provide a critical framework, offering a subversive narrative of how people of color and women are described by search engines.

Me on the Sky Train, snagged a front row seat

I greatly appreciated the opportunity to dine with other “Cross Pollinator” fellows for breakfast two mornings during the conference. Our talks ranged from taxidermy, prisons, Ohio and the perks of living in D.C. and yet still managed to include rich reflection about the work we were doing in our individual libraries and cultural heritage organizations. The Dine-arounds also gave me the opportunity to connect with three wonderful librarians in three different positions with a variety of library experience. Over dinner at Nuba, an excellent Lebanese restaurant, I learned about the history of DLF from two current library directors who were founding members. It was fascinating to hear them talk about the beginning of digitization and the costs of implementing large scale projects back in the day. 

Tabbouleh Salad and Lamb at Nuba

In addition delving deeply into Dr. Safiya Noble, I attended the following sessions just to name a few, "Getting a DPLA Service Hub off the Ground: Sharing Experiences, Challenges, Best Practices and Replicable Hub Models", " Digital Collections as Data: Re-packaging, Re-mixing, and Sharing Collections for New Forms of Scholarship", and " Archivematica as a Service: a Cloud-based, Consortial Approach to Digital Preservation /Mind the Gap. Bridging Digital Libraries & Archives". All these sessions challenged ,e to think about creating a strategy for digital archives integration into the curriculum, determining professor vita sharing needs and how these two issues connects to supporting research and teaching needs, not simply linking data and creating projects for work sake, and defining the first steps in creating workflows for sustainable projects.

All of the sessions were informative but I was most intrigued by the session, “ Starting with 'Yes, And...': Collaborative Instructional Design in Digital Scholarship”  in which all attendees were invited to “commit” to an hour and a half long experiment in Improv sessions used Improv to demonstrate how to overcome communication obstacles between the various groups working together to run the library, including the IT Staff, Curators, Reference Staff, Catalogers and so on. Icebreaker games like “Clap Wave”, “Birthday Game” and “Conducted Story” highlighted the importance of thoughtful listening, teamwork, discovering alternate means of communication and being in the moment, all useful tools in any kind of collaborative library work. 

As a Reference and Public Services Librarian who encountered the error message “link not found” frequently while doing bibliographic instruction, I was fascinated by the New York Public Library’s presentation on Linked Data and building a Public Works Infrastructure. Paving the Way for Better Engagement and Research session. The presenters shared  and explained  how they crowdsourced photo identification and  how unify data from the four major description systems used for their various collections. After this session I posted a question to Twitter about broken links and no less than three librarians immediately engaged me in conversation about my query. This is definitely the most “techie” conference I attended. Having access to community notes and a densely populated Twitter hashtag is something I’ll be looking for at every library conference I attend from  this point forward. 

@canadaplace #selfieatthesails Vancouver 

I really enjoyed the 6 snapshots sessions where I learned about the open access portal College Women: Documenting the History of Women in Higher Education. I immediately thought about how “College Women” was defined and what groups of educated young women were immediately left out of the conversation because their institutions weren’t represented (including Bennett and Spelman Colleges, two historically Black colleges). Thinking about race and gender again, I had  a great conversations with fellow Underepresented Groups Fellows,  T-Kay Sangwand and Yasmeen Shorish about our scholarship name and  whiteness in librarianship. We did not come with an alternate name that felt comfortable because all positioned us ethnically and racially as other. I’d like to continue the conversation and come up with a more complimentary descriptor. 

Baron Davis

Throughout the duration of the conference I learned the names of so many new software titles, programming languages, concepts unique to doing the work of digital libraries including the silos, Another unexpected bonus of attending the forum was running into so many of my former colleagues from my time at Duke Divinity School Library including Joyce Chapman, Jenn Riley and Will Sexton. During my alone time, I met two new faces, NBA player Baron Davis and his teammate Frank, who I sat next to at breakfast at Café Medina. 

The first thing I noticed about the  DLF membership is that it is small and everyone knows one another, therefore it is fairly easy to get involved in committees and approach colleagues about tangible collaborations. While attending the Digital Library Assessment Lunch I volunteered to work with the committee on outreach strategies and  analytics. I am very pleased and grateful to have received the ARL+DLF Underrepresented Groups award and look forward with delight participating in upcoming meetings.

The Harbour featured panels with descriptive text, feeling like an outdoor museum. 

Olympic Torch from 2010 Winter Games 

Views from Outside the Train 

The Harbour

Celebrating Theological Libraries Month at Payne Theological Seminary #TLM2015

When I first started my career as a Theological Librarian, I was psyched to learn that there was a month dedicated to highlight our special roles in the field of librarianship. I also love a good excuse to be creative with public programming, and also PARTY.

Established by the American Theological Library Association (ATLA), Theological Libraries Month (TLM) highlights the vital role libraries and librarians play in theological education. Now an annual October event, this year we will celebrate the month by interviewing Payne Theological Seminary’s esteemed faculty about their reading habits and collecting information about their use of the library.

I've organized three ways the Payne Community to celebrate:

• Using Qualtrics' free survey design software I've invited faculty, students, staff and alumni to help Bishop Reverdy C. Ransom Library assess how well we currently meet their needs and in what areas we might be able to improve. Feedback from the survey will be sued to make improvements to our collections, services, and library spaces, including purchase of major e-journal collections, and the purchase of new scanners and mobile charger

•  The ATLANTIS Listserv is a great place to exchange ideas, tips, share frustrations and keep updated on the latest trends in Theological Librarianship. Jason Fowler, a library director at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary shared his institutions faculty interview project. I reached out and shared my delight and interest in duplicating the idea with Payne's considerably smaller faculty, recognizing that attribution matters. The Library has partnered with Development Office to  record short videos where we ask faculty members, “Outside of the Bible, what book has most influenced you?” In these 2 minute videos professors will share what the book is, who wrote it, and how it influenced them. This will be a great way connect with the Payne Community, share stories about the faculty member’s spiritual formation and highlight the seminary’s incredible resources; people and print!  Videos will be posted weekly during the month of October.  Sonya, Payne's Public Relations and Research Manager shot the video on her Surface Tablet, Raye, Marketing and Alumni Relations Manager created all the graphics and I edited the footage using Windows Movie Maker. Watch the first video below:

• ATLA has created a social media campaign to encourage students, faculty, and staff to visit the stacks during the month of October so that we all might participate in the ATLA’s social media contest. The Task: Create poetry using the titles of books from the library and snap a photo. Pastrons will then post photos to Twitter or Facebook using #TLM2015. Pictures will be tagged to @yourATLA on Twitter or our Facebook so you can be entered into the contest. The contest ends October 31. Three winners will be chosen at random and announced on the ATLA Newsletter. I've encouraged our distance education students to use their personal library of theological titles!  

This Lovely Poem was crated by Archival Intern, Ciana Ayenu

I also took the opportunity to connect the larger campaign with my work as Payne's Theological Librarian. During the month of October I will be off traveling to two conferences representing the Bishop Reverdy C. Ransom Library. I will be attending the 2015 Parliament of World Religions in Salt Lake City, Utah with the ATLA Board of Directors and Diversity Committee on which I serves. As a 2015 ARL + DLF Forum Fellowships for Underrepresented Group, recipient I will travel to Vancouver, BC for the Digital Library Federation Annual conference learning from other library professionals how to support and increase our very own Payne Theological Seminary and AME Church Digital Archive on the Princeton Theological Commons.

I invited patrons to follow me on Twitter and read about my conference participation on this blog. I get the impressions sometimes that the my enthusiasm for libraries is a bit misunderstood by some of my user base and that they don't understand the collaborative nature of the profession or the need to network at conferences. By creating a month of very concrete collaborative activities that center them and require their express participation, I intend to bridge the gap between concept and praxis and create a better library experience for everyone who looks to the Ransom Library to fulfill their information needs.

Reflections from California Rare Book School: Developing and Administering African American Resources

One of my mottos concerning scholarships and professional development opportunities is "Apply, apply, apply, can't win you don't try, if you don't win you're overqualified". It may seem a bit arrogant but it gets to the point.

I don't remember how I originally found out about the Developing African American Collections course at the California Rare Book School but I applied and was awarded the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) Laura Bush 21st Century Librarian Scholarship to attend, as well as a stipend for travel and housing. The class hadn't been offered in 10 years!


The Fashionable Bunch at the Huntington

CAAM Rolled out the Red Carpet

Weeks later, I am still very inspired by the work of my archives and special library colleagues and professors (#sistersinthestacks) August 3-7, in the Developing and Administering African American Resources course at the California Rare Book School at UCLA. The class taught by Randall K. Burkett (Emory University Manuscript, Archives, and Rare Book Library) and Tamar Evangelestia-Doughtery (Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture and Black Metropolis Research Consortium)surveyed case studies of historic black archives in relation to the present state of such institutions. We also explored both traditional and innovative approaches to building African American research collections. The final focus was on building digital collections and using those resources to create connections with researchers with an emphasis on outreach, fundraising and donor relations.
The goals for me were to find ways of providing access to the resources already held at Payne. I wanted more information about developing grant funded projects, and exploring opportunities for collaboration among institutions. The instructors gave us some great background information on African American history and culture as reflected in major collecting institutions such as Emory University, Amistad Research Center at Tulane University, Schomburg Research Center of the New York Public Library, Howard University’s Moorland-Spingarn, and Spelman College.

Learning About African American History in  Collective Memory 

Randall and Dalena, UCLA Special Collections Librarian 

Parker and I bidding for the James Baldwin Papers as Emory University

Our effortlessly fly professor Tamar

Looking at Plantation records form the 1700's at the Mayme Clayton Library

Curator's Talk at the Huntington Library featuring the papers of Octavia Butler

We discussed effective strategies for collecting family papers that can often start with one family member that can lead to developing relationships with not only the other family members but also with friends and their associates who can observe the care and commitment to the original donor’s papers. This “seeding” of donor relations is something to consider in Payne's collecting practices especially since we are the denominational repository for the AME Church.  Do we honestly have the capacity to ingest papers from the denomination given our small archival space without renovating the entire building? Prominent clergy papers housed at Payne in the future can be used as “bait.”

Our discussion of ethical collecting concerned the real problem and something that I am very concerned about, the commodification of papers that has occurred in archives. How do small African American collections compete with the Emory University’s MARBL (which has a fair amount of AME Materials) or UT Austin’s Ransom Center, seemingly endless amounts of money to purchase collections, including collections that would be more appropriate to other collections? We don’t want to lose potential AME collections to larger institutions. This led into a discussion of some of the collections housed in these repositories and others that were competitively acquired. Part of this discussion concerned changing the narrative of African American collections that often are not seen as on par with other materials related to American history. Pushing against this notion has been an uphill battle for many of us in the archival world, but it needs to be taken as seriously as other resources. We need to provide comparable access to these holdings, build these collections at a similar pace to other holdings, and use them in our research, scholarship, and teaching.

One of the best takeaways from the course was the major gifts and donor relations handout created by the Schomburg Center for Research and Black Culture (Please see attached). As I move forward with drafting a strategic plan, fundraising and donor acquisitions are crucial to supporting the future of Payne Digital Archive and physical collection in the Ransom Library I see the need a similar protocol for Payne. I shared examples of thank you letters to donors with Payne's Development Office.

The North Carolina Library Collective #Duke #UNC

We were also given contact information for the grant officers at Mellon, The Institute of Museum of Library Services, The Gates and Ford Foundations and the National Endowment for the Humanities and permission to use our professors as references when we reach out to introduce ourselves. Clearly we were all excited about creating relationships and collaborating with other institutions on major grants and acquisitions. Randall and Tamar are also reviewers for a number of philanthropic library organizations and shared with us a list of projects from Historically Black Colleges and why they were not funded for one reason or another. 

Course Takeaways:

• Tamar's world view shattering lecture on African American History in Collective Memory (What should be remembered or forgotten?). The talk offered an analysis of common narratives in African American history and discussed collective amnesia (who is silenced?) and competing and contested memories.
• Black don't crack. This well known fact could be why colleagues at the Huntington Library neglected to ask us about ourselves and spoke to us as if we were students and not their contemporaries.
• The California African American Museum has amazing exhibitions, a library including a stellar rare book collection and fly librarian who holds no punches
• UCLA Special Collections and the Bunch library have great collections on the political activism of African American student groups at UCLA from the 1960's
• The course syllabus and recommended readings=flames and mo' fire
• The Mayme Clayton Library and Museum is a treasure trove of African American history and culture but unfortunately is suffering from a lack of funding and library trained leadership
• There are some amazing Black women archivists doing important, creative work in special collections across the country. Brothers Parker and Randall along with Sister Anne Coco (get into that name will you?) are putting on for African American Historical Collections as well!  

If the class is offered in the near future apply, apply, apply!

A One Stop Black History Shop: Umbra Search African American History

If you've been reading my blog for some time or know anything about me, you are aware that the digitization of African American Historical Collections is my thing. It might also be on your radar that I am one of the rare librarians who actually enjoys assessment and that I have created a number of digital collection user experience surveys.

 Back in March, when I first arrived at Payne, I received an email from the Society of American Archivists Archives and Archivist of Color Roundtable listserv about an opportunity to test out a new online library of African American Historical objects. After visiting the site and completing the Beta Survey, I immediately saw areas of synergy between the Umbra digital collection and the Payne Theological Seminary and A.M.E. Church Archive.

Slated to officially launch in Winter 2016, the Umbra project is a partnership between the University of Minnesota Libraries’ Givens Collection of African American Literature and Performing Arts Archives, and Penumbra Theatre Company. The Umbra project makes digitally accessible a national collection of digital material order to connect researchers, artists, teachers, and students to over 500 years of African American history, represented by photographs, scripts, manuscripts, maps, news stories, film and video. In its beta form, Umbra contains over 350,000 items. Umbra: Search African American History is supported by the Institute of Museum and Library Services and the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation.

 

After spending the better part of an hour searching the Beta test site I was pleased with how intituitive the search interface was and how accurately it produced results with fairly simple subject phrases. Umbra expertly recommended great related subjects for review. I also searched for under-highlighted figures in both African American and A.M.E. history and was still rewarded with enough relevant sources to craft a small exhibit in Omeka (whether or not one can create a page on a topic or person in Omeka is a good metric for me). Items featured in the collection link back to the original contributor's page but still open in a consistent design on the Umbra site. There is consistency in user experience (font, color, size, graphic elements) across the site. The Umbra project is also the "bee knees" because its contributors represent a range of cultural heritage organizations including majority academic libraries, museums, heritage registers, and the archives of historically black college and universities. Partners include The Schomburg, University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill, Yale University, African American Registry and...wait for it...Payne Theological Seminary.  

 

Payne materials will be included in the portal and Umbra A.M.E materials (approximately 3,262 items) will be incorporated into a future Payne digital archive to be hosted at www.payne.edu. I reached out to Cecily Marcus, Principal Investigator of the project to discuss the inclusion of materials from the Payne Theological Seminary and A.M.E. Church Digital Collection. The project is well administered as evidenced by the Umbra Partner Agreement that addresses metadata and image issues, including copyright and Letter of Understanding that addresses other partnership opportunities. This was a collaboration that made immediate sense for Payne stakeholders and the project coordinators' attention to detail and concerns for copyright and proper attribution in this digital age assuaged any concerns I had about participating. Along with our items being included in the national discovery platform, an embeddable widget that brings together digitized metadata and images will be featured on the Payne portal so that users with a range of interests can search broadly African American history.

Click here to become a Beta Tester and find out more about the collection!

Mining The Information Landscape: ATLA Annual Conference Denver June 17-21 2015 #Charleston #Emanuel9 #ActivistLibrarian

E. J. Josey speaking at a Conference circa 1970, The American Library Association Archives

I've been inspired by activist librarian E.J. Josey since I was first introduced to his work and legacy in library school at North Carolina Central University. I've incorporated this quote in almost every diversity program I've applied to since that time:

“It has been my professional goal to promote cultural diversity, not only in the profession of

librarianship and in libraries, but in American society as well.” ~Dr. E.J. Josey

I was compelled to embody the spirit of Dr. Josey at ATLA this year. Maybe FORCED is more appropriate. 

This post has taken me almost a month to write and I still don't feel up for the task. Therefore, this post won't be as comprehensive as it could've been had I not procrastinated so long. I don't really feel like retelling the story because since the Emanuel 9 Massacre, another mass shooting by a white supremacist has occurred, the Confederate Flag at the State Capital in South Carolina has been removed and at least 20 additional unarmed African Americans have been murdered by police in America. Surely, I'll be leaving a lot out to preserve the reputations of some of my colleagues. I am happy that ATLA is committed to working towards diversity and encouraged by the support of many #STAYWOKE theological librarians who clearly believe that #BLACKLIVESMATTER and diversity is not about numbers.

 I'll preface by saying the conference was great, however it was emotionally exhausting. I appreciate how receptive, timely and accommodating the ATLA Board of Directors were to myself and Jessica Bellemer's (Director of Library Services, Hood Theological Seminary) call to action. Special thank you's to ATLA President Beth Bidlack. Director of Library Services, Burke Library, Union Theological Seminary and Chris Anderson, Methodist Archivist, Director of Special Collections, Drew University. This post will be organized into three separate sections for clarity of narrative: Diversity Committee Pre-Conference Workshops, Emanuel 9 Board Response, and Self-Care.

Diversity Committee Pre-Conference Workshops

• Back in January at our committee meeting we decided to hold a series of workshops and discussions about Racial Equity in Theological Librarianship at annual conference.
• The day was divided into two learning environments: a morning session provided by The Denver Inclusiveness Project to help us better understand the value of inclusiveness and identify steps needed to create diversity, including training in the awareness of the impact of racism on institutions.
• The afternoon session included a panel of ATLA members and guests who shared their personal experiences with racial equity issues and a discussion of how to address these issues in the context of theological librarianship
• Both sessions were exceptional. There was rich, honest, vulnerable dialogue and a resolve among the small number of attendees to continue the conversation within the larger professional association and back home in there practices at home libraries. 

Handout Shared by Denver Inclusiveness Project 

One of the creative works circulating Tumblr within hours of the story hitting mainstream media

Emmanuel 9 Board Response

• I checked my phone the evening of June 17th after a full day of diversity training to find Tumblr (the story was a bit slow to hit national news, social media is more and more showing itself to be the better tool for "breaking news") flooded with stories about 9 members of the Mother Emanuel A.M.E. Church in Charleston, South Carolina who had been shot to death by a young white man they welcomed into their usual evening Bible Study
• The President of ATLA announced at the plenary session that 9 had been murdered at Mother Emanuel A.M.E. Church
• The crowd of librarians, many holding tablets and smart devices GASPED. Audibly. LOUDLY. 
• I was surprised and disappointed that so many hadn't heard. I understood we were a bit isolated by travel and attending the conference, but these we librarians, who I believed were responsible for being aware of what's going in the world (its part of the job description). 
• After the session I ran into my mentor and Methodist librarian, Chris A. We commiserated together. 
• I ran into fellow millennial and AMEZ librarian, Jess A. in the vendor hall. We came up with a plan of action. 
• We organized a lunchtime chat at the hotel restaurant with the ATLA President and Director of Member Programs for those who wanted to talk about the tragedy. They graciously covered the meals of all attendees.
• Quite a few members of the Board of directors attended and were extremely active in the conversation.
• Jess and I worked throughout the afternoon to petition the Board to formulate an official response to the act of terrorism. Which I read aloud at the end of the Business Meeting. (see video below and resolution below) 
• The Board convened. There were concerns raised and relayed from other members about where ATLA stood as far as politics, activism and diversity in relation to ALA. 
• A proclamation was written and read at the ending plenary session.
• Conversation continued after the conference via email among ATLA librarians via the ATLANTIS Listserv. Some of the responses made my stomach turn and hand shake, others (many sent directly to me off list) made me proud and optimistic about my membership in the organization and recent political act.   

We petition the board to convene to discuss an appropriate ongoing response for ATLA as an organization which builds upon the lunchtime discussion organized and attended by ATLA members about the religious and racial terrorism act, a dialogue that was inspired by the recent act which victimized the congregation at Mother Emmanuel AME Church’ in Charleston, SC, the victims of which ‘include alumni of ATLA member institutions and a professional librarian.
Whereas the board has been petitioned to make an appropriate ongoing response to the recent act of “religious and racial terrorism” that occurred at Mother Emanuel AME Church in Charleston, SC; and

Whereas this act occurred in a sacred religious space and impacted clergy, librarians, and their communities; and

Whereas the work of ATLA contributes to the formation of religious leaders and librarians; and

Whereas the victims included prominent leaders in the African American community; and

Whereas one victim (Cynthia Hurd) was an influential public librarian; and

Whereas two of the victims (The Rev. Clementa C. Pinckney and The Rev. Dr. Daniel L. Simmons, Sr.) were alumni of Lutheran Theological Southern Seminary, an ATLA institutional member; and

Whereas one of the victims (The Rev. Clementa Pinckney) was a D.Min. candidate at Wesley Theological Seminary, another ATLA institutional member; and

Whereas these tragic events directly speak counter to our core value of “Hospitality, inclusion, and diversity”;

Therefore be it resolved that we the board condemn this act of racially motivated violence that emerged out of a larger environment of social injustice;

Be it further resolved that the board commend its members for leading this discussion;

Be it further resolved that the board encourage continued member input into how to live into our core value and contribute to a change in the larger social environment;

Be it further resolved that the board encourages members to make appropriate resources available to their communities; and

Be it further resolved that the board expresses its grief and its solidarity with those affected by this tragedy.

• After returning to Ohio and reading the responses of my colleagues on our ATLANTIS listserv I sent out the following email about the #Charlestonsyllabus shared by a Society of American Archivists Archives and Archivists of Color Roundtable:  

Greetings Fellow ATLA Colleagues,

Following up on our post Annual Conference ATLANTIS Listserv conversations and Board’s encouragement that we “make appropriate resources available to [our] communities”, I am sharing this incredible guide created by the African American Intellectual History Society #CharlestonSyllabus

Here is a list of readings that educators can use to broach conversations in the classroom about the horrendous events that unfolded in Charleston, South Carolina on the evening of June 17, 2015. These readings provide valuable information about the history of racial violence in this country and contextualize the history of race relations in South Carolina and the United States in general. They also offer insights on race, racial identities, global white supremacy and black resistance. All readings are arranged by date of publication. This list is not meant to be exhaustive–you will find omissions. Please check out #Charlestonsyllabus and the Goodreads List for additional reading suggestions.

http://aaihs.org/resources/charlestonsyllabus/

Program given to Payne Theological Seminary by surviving ministerial staff member and Payne MDiv Student Rev. Michelle Frayer

Inside program
My apologies that Blogger won't let me rotate the image

Self-Care

• I attended all the workshops on diversity during the conference and fantastic sessions on outreach in special collections, best practices for writing collection development policies and EBooks for small libraries. These workshops directly supported the work I would be doing in my new role as Director of Library Services at Payne Theological Seminary. 
• Friday I decided I had enough and needed a real break from everything and everyone so I went out on the town, alone. 
• My good friend librarian Katie who interned with me at the National Transportation Library is a native of Denver and directed me around the city via cellphone.
• The wealth disparity is evident as soon as you walk downtown. There is a serious homelessness problem in the city. All throughout the week native Denver(ians?) were telling me about how expensive housing is (condos upwards of 200K). 
• My impression of the city: A walkable, beautiful city with good food, eccentric people with a few obvious class issues. 
• Here are pictures of what I did:

In War Memorial Park

View from the rail downtown 

I think those are buffaloes

Katie's Favorite Restaurant 

I Needed a Drink

Ate the El Jefe for Katie 

Denver Public Library

Coco-Rhina Beverage

El Jefe Burger with Curried Carrot Soup. The Curried Carrot Soup was BOMB. 

It was closed :( 

Interesting Advice on the Bathroom Door at City O' City

SCAIG Spring 2015 Workshop: Special but not Specialized: Special Collections and Archives Do it All at Kent State University

This 12 story building houses the library, archives and special collections along with a number of departments. The billboard announces "You Belong Here". Perfect!

On June 3, I drove 3.5 hours (each way) Northeast to Kent State University to attend the SCAIG Spring 2015 Workshop: Special but not Specialized: Special Collections and Archives Do it All. The overall theme/purpose was getting to know our special collections and archives colleagues from around the state and hold conversations about the most pressing issues affecting our work. The informal presentations "Reference and Instruction", "Let Them Build It: Working with Students to Curate Digital Exhibits" and "Problems? What Problems? Attitude is Everything for Lone Arrangers" were extremely encouraging and insightful. I learned great strategies for getting faculty "buy-in" for including digital objects and archives in their courses, how to match assessment to learning outcomes, ideas for designing the library page at Payne, how to use social media effectively to share our collections, and development events that benefit the entire institution (Business Card Exchanges and Alumni Library Sponsorship).

One new cool feature of the workshop were the World Cafe Style Conversations. I brainstormed with colleagues about Instruction/Assessment, Outreach, and Preservation/Digitization/Born Digital/Technology.

I also had the opportunity to spend lunch with a 2 colleagues who presented at SOA about their archival move a few weeks ago and ended up sitting with two other NC Library School alums at lunch (North Carolina State and UNC-Chapel Hill). Small World!

One word: BABAR. Imagine walking to room bursting with color and whimsy and BABAR. It's available and within reach.

Kent State is home to the one-of-a-kind collection, bequeathed to Kent State University in 1992 by John L. Boonshaft of Las Vegas, Nevada, containing books and artifacts relating to Babar, the fictional elephant created by Jean de Brunhoff in 1931 and perpetuated by his son, Laurent, after Jean died in 1937.

 But honestly, the very best part of the conference was connecting with La'el Hughes-Watkins, University Archivist, Assistant Professor, Kent State University Libraries. After touring The Kent State Shootings and Their Aftermath" Through The Media's Lens exhibit curated by La'el we chatted about our paths to archives and what it meant to be women of color in administrative positions in the library world. We were encouraged by one another's journey's and made fast friends (even attending RibFest in a few weeks!). I was fascinated to learn how La'el pulled from her background in journalism to curate the Through The Media's Lens chronological exhibit which highlights some of the major newspaper headlines, magazines, photographs, newsletters, posters, flyers and comic strips produced in light of the Kent State Shootings. The exhibit and meeting her alone were worth the 7 hour road trip. Check out the pics from this wonderful day:

Me and Rockwell "Rocky" K. Squirrel, University Libraries Official Spokes-squirrel (who has his own business cards)

Through the Lens

I love how the exhibit "bleed" into the hallway outside the reading room where the exhibit is house. These display cases are exceptional!

Life sized BABAR!

They even made Babar labels!

Huge in house scanner for library signage and other paper production. I wish!

In the archives stacks 

Two Dynamic Overachieving Archivists making our mark in the field