GSLIS doctoral student Noah Lenstra was recently named recipient of the Fred S. Bailey Fellowship for Community Leadership, Service, and Activism by the University YMCA. The award supports graduate students who have shown a strong commitment to community organizing, activism, and/or service.
Lenstra is the project director of eBlack Champaign-Urbana, a collaborative program focused on creating a digital library of historical and cultural material, blogs, videos, and other media of the African-American community in Champaign-Urbana. The award recognizes Lenstra’s efforts to build new networks and linkages between the University of Illinois and this community.
“The quality of the applicants exceeded our expectations, but I think what really set Noah apart were the varied and diverse ways he works within the Champaign-Urbana African American community to ensure equal access to both the acquisition and creation of information,” said Kasey Umland, program director at the University YMCA and administrator of the fellowship. “Noah applies his skill and expertise as a librarian in very direct ways that impact members of our community across generations in ways that are simultaneously very personal and yet essential to our collective understanding.”
The University YMCA has awarded Bailey scholarships to undergraduate students for a number of years, but 2013 is the first year graduate fellowships have been offered. “We hear so frequently that graduate students are not given time or support to engage in community development work because of the emphasis on research and publishing, and we wanted to challenge that idea while finding ways to support and reward those who apply their knowledge locally and globally,” said Umland.
An example of Lenstra’s efforts is a series of workshops he implemented in 2012 in cooperation with the Community Informatics Research Laboratory at GSLIS, led by Professor Abdul Alkalimat and Assistant Professor Kate Williams. In partnership with libraries and schools throughout central Illinois, the workshops introduced community members to basic social and technical procedures for launching, building, and sustaining community-based digitization programs. Williams noted that these workshops also served as data for an analysis of family and community history completed by Lenstra, which will be submitted for publication. "This work and this award reflect Noah's research focus as well,” she said.
Lenstra credits much of his success to the supportive people with whom he has worked throughout his research, both in the community and at GSLIS. “I personally consider the fellowship to be a great honor and can say that it would not have been possible without the confidence and commitment placed in me by the individuals who wrote letters of recommendation—Professor Abdul Alkalimat, Anke Voss of the Urbana Free Library, and Carol and Joe Lewis from Salem Baptist Church, as well as by many others in the local community,” said Lenstra, “My adviser Kate Williams and the Community Informatics Research Lab she and Professor Alkalimat run has served and continues to serve as a vital infrastructure making this kind of engaged research possible.”
The award provides a monthly stipend and covers tuition and fees for the academic year. Lenstra plans to use the time afforded him by the fellowship to inspire and engage undergraduate students, particularly those who are Bailey scholarship recipients and others who are active in University YMCA programs.