Charles L. Blockson Afro-American Collection

Key Activities and Accomplishments FY 17-18

My eleventh year as Curator of the Charles L. Blockson Afro-American Collection was a great year, especially for partnerships and collaborations, increased community outreach, broader accessibility to Blockson resources, exploring new opportunities in publishing and scholarly communication and identifying new avenues of economic support.

I worked closely with my staff on innovative projects around processing, preserving and digitizing rare materials as well public programs, exhibitions, presentations and tours of the Blockson collection. I continued to observe and direct the performance of Aslaku Berhanu, Librarian, Leslie Willis-Lowry, Associate Archivist and Serkaddis Alemayehu, Public History Coordinator and Digital Archives Specialist as well as volunteer staff member Al Vara. Among Aslaku’s duties, she performed reference services, user education and liaison services, cataloging and library committee work.

We worked together on collection development, submission of a PEW grant application, exhibitions and public programs and community relations.

Some examples of Leslie Willis-Lowry’s work include extensive community and institutional outreach with use of archival materials, especially the John W. Mosley photographs including exhibitions, documentaries/videos and television, web/digital projects and publications/articles/dissertations.

Serkaddis assisted me in conducting oral history interviews as well as contributed to exhibits, instructional services, and public programs. She also worked with Aslaku on a rare pamphlet digitization project. Aslaku,

Leslie and Serkaddis served on library committees.

Our staff worked with Sara Wilson and others to coordinate public programs and other activities.

Al Vara provided volunteer services as needed.

Strategic Actions Supported by Blockson in FY 18-19

Enriching the environment for learning and student success.

Developing programs, services, and resources to enhance intellectual productivity,
scholarly infrastructure, new modes of research, and clinical care services.

Seeking partners in innovation and experimentation to add value to library programs
and to identify new avenues for economic support.

Serving as a center of intellectual and cultural life. 

Serving as a repository of record for archival, rare, and unique materials and providing
broad access to those collections.

Building a world-class staff for leadership in the research library enterprise.