Photo credit: http://www.civicmediacenter.org/oral-history-project
Photo credit: EOC Graduation, 2014, Bronx Community College
“Raising Ourselves Up”: Oral Histories from First-Generation College Students at BCC is a Collaborative Experiential Learning Pilot Project to build a video oral history archive to document the stories of first-generation college students on our campus. Each student’s time at BCC is unique, yet all students are bound to each other by the shared sense of struggle towards achieving a college education. Using video oral history interviews, students will examine the challenges faced by low-income, working-class groups of peer students from various ethnic, racial, and immigrant backgrounds, groups that BCC is dedicated to serving and who have been historically underrepresented in higher education. Our project will be a team effort, combining resources provided by the Archives (Prof. Cynthia Tobar) and Student Support Services/General Counseling Department (Dr. Nelson Reynoso). Beginning with interviews collected in Fall 2016, this project will help inspire resiliency among BCC students by showing positive examples of overcoming adversity to attain a college education.
To view the interviews we've collected so far, visit our site at https://bcc1stgen.commons.gc.cuny.edu/
This project is made possible by a Presidential grant by Bronx Community College, CUNY.
Photo credit: The Laundromat Project
StoryBlock is an oral history and visual community archive that celebrates the cultural richness of Kelly Street residents living in the Longwood section of the South Bronx. This project who was commissioned by The Laundromat Project’s Create Change Program and is now currently archived at Bronx Community College’s Archives. StoryBlock was the result of a collaboration between artists Sasha Phyars-Burgess and Alison Hall Kibbe, as a continuation of their Hunts Point Create Change Fellows 2014 Field Day project. These narratives shed light on the past, present and future of Kelly Street, the South Bronx, New York City, and the diversity and beauty of our individual and collective stories.
The StoryBlock oral history collection is published and available for research use on JSTOR: https://www.jstor.org/site/bronx-community-college/storyblock/