Or, “Building Trust Between Archives and the Student Body: Hiring Student Historians” or even, “My Undergraduate Experience at the Midwestern Archives Conference: Why More Paid Positions Like Mine Must Exist On Campus”

by Rena Yehuda Newman (They/Them), Student Historian in Residence

“Student Memory: Then and Now” Poster by Rena Yehuda Newman (They/Them), presented at MAC 2019 in Detroit

This year, I had the honor of attending the Midwest Archives Conference (MAC) 2019 in Detroit, Michigan for a couple days sitting in on sessions, learning about the archival profession, and presenting my poster entitled “Student Memory: Then and Now”. I’d been to conferences before but the Midwest Organic and Sustainable Education Service (MOSES) Agricultural conference was, as you might guess, a little bit of a different vibe than an Archives meet-up.

The conference was informative and occasionally quirky (including the damaged document recovery vendor giving out vacuum-sealed beef jerky as a freebie). I attended sessions on imposter syndrome in the profession, documenting the HIV/AIDS crisis in the Midwest, and #Archives4BlackLives. In the time outside the conference, I wandered around Detroit with a friend, checking out a public installation in honor of organized labor, exploring the Detroit Institute of Art, and walking by the Church of Scientology up the street from our hotel. Critiques of many sessions included, the conference was an enriching and enlightening experience -- especially considering that, a little over a year ago, I had only a basic understanding of what an archives even was.

I may have been the only undergraduate at the conference, my age surprising many of the University Archivists who approached me to discuss my poster. While the poster discussed parts of my research and its relevance to the present, the bulk of my presentation centered around questions of archives outreach and community engagement, documenting the experiences of the student body and peer-educating about what an archives is and does. In my presentation, I wanted to suggest that archives can be supportive spaces for student activists on campus and archivists can be their accomplices in their pursuit of justice. I made a short list of action steps.

How can archivists support student activism?

Collaborate with student organizers, government, and groups to preserve student memory, especially for contemporary issues

Listen to the needs of students, especially marginalized students, asking: how archival collections can be of service to them?

Host events and workshops about relevant historical campus movements and protests

Encourage students to think of themselves as historical subjects by leading workshops teaching students how to document their experiences

Provide accessible opportunities for students to contribute their own meaningful, modern materials to the campus archives

But most importantly...

Fund paid student staff positions, employing students to do archival research, outreach, and modern documentation

On my poster I was transparent about the wages, conditions, responsibilities, and privileges of my position as Student Historian in Residence, which is well-paid, supported by the staff, and flexible in terms of time and content. By being compensated for my labor, I’ve been able to spend the time that I need to in the archives working on all sorts of projects that benefit the archives and (I hope) serve the student body.

Though the Student Historian position began this year as a pilot research opportunity, the work has sprouted into other projects, like creating a teaching kit about the Black Student Strike, spreading the gospel of archives by presenting to classrooms around campus, leading late-night archives sessions on topics like “Queer History”, teaching student government about self-documentation, and most recently, conducting interviews for a modern oral history project on UW-Madison student activism from 2016 - 2019.

While non-student staff keep the wonderful Archives ship afloat, this kind of outreach work can only be done by a student. I’m not saying that I’m the student who should do this work -- this isn’t about me, it’s about student labor in general. The importance and value of archival peer education is immense. The benefits of trust between the student body and their campus archives are best achieved when student staff members are given the opportunity to take ownership over the archives and bring that passion to the rest of their circles, letting other students know that their campus archives is a place where their collective work can be remembered. This quality of work can only happen if students are paid for it -- and paid well.

At the conference, I had one university archivist approach me and ask how their archives could create these student community connections without a budget. Was there a way she could get the same results without paying students for their work?

As the Student Historian, I have the profound opportunity to spend hours familiarizing myself with materials, reflecting on my learning, meeting with staff members, creating projects to serve my fellow students, and sharing my work with the rest of my community. This position requires a lot of time each week and has yielded projects that the Archives staff and I are proud of. Yet for many marginalized, low-income students -- all of whom would offer unique, necessary perspectives into these archival pursuits -- this opportunity would be inaccessible were it unpaid. Many students can’t afford to work for free. I answered that, while there are many steps an archives can take to support student activism and document these corners of student life, by not paying students for documentation or research, an archive creates a barrier for access and excludes the brightest, most marginalized students on campus from sharing their perspectives and benefiting from the enormous opportunity that archival work has to offer.

To University Archivists interested in the above: Apply for grants to fund student projects. Find funding for student staff members to do research, outreach, and modern materials collection.

Archives are a place for activism, for students to reclaim campus memory as their own. Do yourself and the student body a favor -- create more positions like mine and spread the archives love inside the reading room and beyond.