Introduction
The project described in this article commenced a few years ago when I started my role as a professor at the City University of New York (CUNY). It later grew as part of my culminating project for the Interactive Technology and Pedagogy Certificate Program at the same institution. Integrating the CUNY Digital History Archive into my teaching praxis at CUNY was a goal I set out for myself in response to my own journey as an undergraduate student of the university. My unique experience as an undergraduate with the Puerto Rican and Latino Studies Department at Brooklyn College–CUNY began to inform me about some of CUNY’s history. Professors of the department would share stories about the history of the college. It is from this experience that I developed what I refer to as the Learning CUNY History project. The project integrates the CUNY Digital History Archive (CDHA), a counter-institutional archive that centers the experiences of students, workers, faculty, community residents, retirees, and alumni. The CDHA represents a counter-institutional archive because it is an open, participatory digital public archive and portal that gives the CUNY community and the broader public open access to a range of archival materials related to the history of the City University of New York.
I posit that integrating digital tools into the teaching and learning experience with students can result in better academic outcomes, such as higher graduation rates, increase in attendance and accumulation of credits. The project began with the CUNY Digital History Archive and has evolved to include the digital mapping of the archive. I offer this article to continue sharing CUNY history and as an invitation for you to also integrate the teaching and learning of CUNY into your courses, programs, and initiatives throughout CUNY, and beyond. For anyone not immediately associated with CUNY, the archive used for this project is multi-disciplinary and can also be edited to reflect many different institutions as well.
In this paper, I first explain the theoretical frameworks that inform instructional decisions and inclusion of digital tools with some discussion about the historical context of the archive used. Secondly this paper discusses the integration of a digital archive and digital mapping as tools for teaching and learning. I then discuss the initial implementation of the project and expand on how it grew to include the digital mapping component. Lastly, I conclude with findings, briefly discussing examples of student projects and the limitations of the piloted project. This article is offered as an overview of the Learning CUNY History project and not created as a step-by-step guide.1
A Digital Pedagogical Praxis
Attempting to build students’ digital literacy skills and explore their engagement with historical events related to their undergraduate institution, I integrated digital archives and a digital mapping program into the Learning CUNY History project. Existing studies demonstrate the benefits of integrating digital tools in the course to enhance students’ learning experience (Bass 1998; Gordon, Elwood, and Mitchell 2016). For example, students can develop their digital technological and literacy skills by becoming familiar with online software or computer commands and through the use of digital mapping, manipulating text into HTML code. Digital mapping software allows students the opportunity to complete low-stakes written assignments as points or markers on the map. This content allows students to demonstrate the development of knowledge related to the course. The “markers” students create on their digital map allow them to add HTML links for archival images and simultaneously draft essays, other writings and/or creative projects. The exploration of digital archives and digital mapping also enables students to curate content, topics, and themes related to the curricula, positioning students as producers of knowledge within the educational space.
Developing these technological proficiencies aligns with the need to prepare for an ever-evolving digital technology-based society. As computer and communication technologies evolve and are more deeply integrated into all aspects and structures of societies around the world, it is important to activate student interest and engagement with the possibilities of such advancements. Students’ sense of empowerment is connected to learning new digital skills, enabling them to feel confident and proud of the learning experience because of the projects they complete.
Historical Background: The Story of Puerto Rican Studies at Brooklyn College
The efforts of a mostly Puerto Rican and African American student-led struggle within CUNY in the years after 1968 contributed to the establishment of the larger field of U.S.-based Puerto Rican Studies (PRS) programs. As a pioneering discipline, PRS also contributed to the fields of Latino Studies and Ethnic Studies, transforming curricula across the nation. The courses I refer to in this paper are offered by the Puerto Rican and Latino Studies (PRLS) department at Brooklyn College–CUNY. The piloted project was implemented in the courses I have taught since the 2022–2023 academic year. They vary between a 100-level course, a 300-level course, and a graduate seminar course. The enrollment for each course differed: 30, 15, and 20, respectively. Additionally, the courses varied in modality between in-person, hybrid, and online (using the Zoom platform), also respectively.
The story of Puerto Rican Studies at Brooklyn College is available in more detail within the CUNY Digital History Archive (CDHA). It is a collection of 39 items which includes images, documents, and oral histories. The collection is connected to the documentary film, Making the Impossible Possible, an interdisciplinary film that can be used for many courses within the humanities, education, social sciences, and many more fields. Shortly after its premier, the film activated as screenings into educational spaces sharing and preserving a piece of Brooklyn College and CUNY history, but the archival materials were still dormant. In response to this, I curated the Puerto Rican Studies at Brooklyn College (PRSBC) collection for the CDHA. The contents of the digital collection include several items from Brooklyn College’s Archives and Special Collections; items collected for the production of the film; and items collected from my involvement with community-based initiatives that seek to preserve the history of Puerto Ricans in the U.S. The items for the collection were chosen by me, in response to a dearth of information published, as of 2020, that is related to the impact Puerto Rican students at Brooklyn College had on the transformation of the CUNY system during the 1960s and 70s into a more ethnically, racially, and linguistically diverse university system representative of the NYC community. The PRSBC collection is the digital archival collection used in this discussion of the Learning CUNY history project. For anyone interested in remixing the project, there are at least 30 different collections on the CDHA to choose from.
Digital archives
In general, archival materials at educational institutions sit in their carefully protected boxes waiting to be occasionally pulled for specific research projects or exhibitions. At Brooklyn College the library area outside of the glass doors housing the Archives and Special Collections is often a more robust and consistent flow of student activity. In my own experience, I became acquainted with archival materials only after I graduated from Brooklyn College, even though I had frequented the library as an undergraduate. This is in part why I became interested in exploring ways I could mobilize archival materials as project-based assignments into the courses I taught.
Archives are institutionally validated through a process of categorization, digitization, and preservation within different institutions employing trained professionals. Archives go through a process of requirements usually informed by either the Open Archival Information System or the Trusted Repository Archiving Checklist validating the primary sources as reputable archive materials (Guiliano 2022). Archives are digital and physical resources useful for intergenerational learning that is reflective of various disciplines and meet the various needs of the student body. Bass (1998) describes the integration of archives as an opportunity to “bring new contexts and spaces for reshaping the processes of reading and writing, and ultimately, critical thinking,” an evaluation still relevant today, almost three decades after Bass’s writing.
Digital mapping
My pedagogical purpose in activating mapping for the Learning CUNY History project was for students to interact with archival materials in a distinct way, encouraging them to think about their physical presence and involvement on campus today—thus transcending decades of history to connect with the struggles from the late 1960s and 1970s. Students could use the Puerto Rican Studies at Brooklyn College (PRSBC) collection to digitally map the location of student protests and demonstrations to identify which areas on campus are directly linked to this historical legacy. Digital mapping is a flexible and openly available tool that can be used “with the aim of connecting students closer to each other, to the higher education institution, to the community and to the world at large,” matching the goals of the Learning CUNY History project (Gordon, Elwood, and Mitchell 2016).
The PRSBC collection contains images that depict geographical locations on campus, enabling students to be able to pinpoint where to place their markers on the digital map. Often we talk about new areas on campus that students may not have been aware of. For instance, the flag pole depicted on a collection item titled Student Activists standing guard at the 1969 flag raising ceremony during Malcolm X Day and Memorial at Brooklyn College has been a new location of reference for students throughout several semesters. Other items from the PRSBC collection include addresses on letterheads, and the oral histories with narrative descriptions facilitating students with the ability to identify geographical locations. If the item doesn’t contain identifiable geographical information, students are encouraged to use the collection essay or other related items as a next step in their investigation. Doing so enables the student to analyze the item through different historical perspectives. Students also have the choice of placing the item as a marker on the map in a location of their choice and can include a statement in the description explaining the decision for using such location.
Digital mapping is also used as a tool for multimodal literacies informing the process of learning (Fedorenko 2019). Mapping as praxis “can also be used to mobilize an expanded critical spatial thinking—one that extends to young people’s understanding of space as central to the negotiation of power in society,” directly connecting to the overall pedagogical goals of the project (Gordon, Elwood and Mitchell 2016). The content of the CUNY Digital History Archive contains narratives as items that describe a people’s confrontation against oppressive power in society. Within the praxis I discuss in this paper, critical spatial thinking is defined as the “knowledge, skills, and habits of mind to use concepts of space, tools of representation (such as maps), and processes of reasoning to structure problems, find answers, and express solutions to these problems” (Sinton and Bednarz 2007). The following is a discussion about the process of developing the Learning CUNY History project. I begin by detailing the initial phase, which aimed at integrating Brooklyn College and CUNY history by using the CDHA; I then explain how the project grew to integrate the digital mapping component.
Initial Project Phase
The Learning CUNY History project started as two or three 75-minute course-sessions, depending on the number of students enrolled. It has been successfully implemented into one graduate seminar-session (2 hours & 45 minutes). An Open Education Resource with a more detailed account of project implementation is currently being developed and will become available on the CDHA website.
Intro activity: part I
Since I have the distinct opportunity of having a documentary film that complements the archival collection I use for the Learning CUNY History project, I begin by screening the film during the first week of the semester to contextualize course content and demonstrate to students how archival materials can be used to tell a story. The film is available to members of the CUNY network through the Mina Rees library website and can be accessed by the public through the Third World Newsreel website. Integrating the film extends the project by 45–60 minutes than previously stated (30 minutes for viewing the film, and approximately 15–30 minutes for discussion with students about the film).
Intro activity: part II
As an introduction to the CDHA archive, I offer students an overview of the CUNY Digital History Archive website, demonstrating the different menu options and how to navigate the different sections of the website, such as how to browse by collection, time period, or subject. The goal of this introductory activity is for students to become familiar with the archive and generally takes up one 75-minute course-session. On the CDHA website we navigate to the Puerto Rican Studies at Brooklyn College (PRSBC) collection and review the different sections of the collections landing page. We review the contents of the archive and discuss the functions of the menu items on the right, focusing on the various relationships between the listed items.
We read and discuss the intro essay, often as a collective group, and if there are more than 12 students enrolled, students read and discuss with each other in smaller groups. The group discussions contribute to a sense of community within the course, as students meet and interact with one another. They are also learning about and from each other through their various perspectives analyzing the content of the essay. Students begin to recognize themselves as part of a historical event that enables them to take the courses offered by the department, more than five decades later. One student remarked, “I found this [project] remarkably interesting because the effort [Puerto Rican and African American students] made in the college allowed myself and other students to take courses that teach us about Puerto Rico and its history.” A sense of belonging emerges when students make comments like this, connecting them intergenerationally.
Main activity
As part of the second session for the project, students are invited to engage with the CDHA beyond the PRSBC collection. I structure this similarly to the intro activity, except I guide students to interact more fully with the website and invite them to write short responses reflecting and interpreting an item (or items) they would like to focus on. Students are encouraged to browse the website by collection, time period, or subject and are then guided to work independently as they identify, read, and analyze an item or items of their choosing.
Throughout this phase of the project, students are encouraged to turn and talk to a peer near them or are placed into randomized breakout rooms online to share their progress, process, questions, and insights about the item(s) they chose. We then reform as one collective group and engage in a “share-back” discussion describing what new information students gathered from the CUNY Digital History Archive. I am always eager to learn from the items students choose as I have not gone through all 1,046 items in the CUNY Digital History Archive.
The development of critical thinking skills occurs more explicitly during this phase of the project, as students are engaging in a process of reasoning that “incorporates stages of categorization, interpretation, analysis, evaluation, assessment, inference, [and] explanation” aligning with the learning outcomes of the course (Sinton and Lund 2007). This phase is also an opportunity for students to embody authority of the learning process since they are making their own decisions and have the opportunity to disseminate their knowledge with peers through the share-back. Students are given agency to interact with the archive and make decisions that will impact the overall learning of everyone in the course, including the professor.
Student Engagement with the CDHA
In this section I briefly share student experiences with the Learning CUNY History project resulting from its early implementation, before digital mapping was integrated. One of the more memorable findings was from a student who chose the "Right to Breathe/Right to Know: Industrial Air Pollution in Greenpoint-Williamsburg." They expressed an appreciation for having learned that CUNY was involved in advocating for clean air quality in their neighborhood, signaling a sense of connection to the university. Students have consistently chosen the Open Admissions and Covid-related collections. Reflecting on the #CutCovidNotCUNY collection a student wrote, “I relate to the struggles and stress that I had with my education during the pandemic. I would share this piece with my school or people who go to school in general because I think it would help people feel less alone with the feelings they had during the pandemic.” These two examples demonstrate how the Learning CUNY History project enables students to practice critical thinking and apply that process to aspects of their own lives and the collective of society.
Growing the Project
The mapping component of the Learning CUNY History project was integrated after a couple of semesters, as a method of expanding the inclusion of digital archives into a more interactive and visually based outcome aligned with the #unessay approach. Evidence suggests integrating mapping into the teaching and learning experience is important because it enables students to “see more, understand more, and engage more deeply with the subject matter” (Sinton and Lund 2007). Digital mapping was an opportunity to further activate the archive.2
When I first implemented digital mapping, we used the ZeeMaps software, an enterprise-class mapping service that allows users to create, publish, and share relatively easy interactive maps. I had previously used ZeeMaps for a project with a museum in Connecticut and as the only mapping software I was familiar with I decided to return to it. It offered a free plan and seemed to fit project needs. After using it that first semester, students and I quickly learned that the ZeeMaps platform did not meet our needs, as the basic/free plan restricted the number of map views and cluttered the map with ads. By the end of that semester, we ended up with a deactivated map having surpassed the limited 100 lifetime views.
After some research into other digital mapping software and guidance from my ITP mentor and advisor, I decided to integrate the use of Open Street Map and the uMap mapping program. Open Street Map (OSM) is open data and built by a community of mappers that contribute and maintain data about roads, trails, cafés, railway stations, and much more, all over the world. uMap is an open source OSM project that lets users create layers for customized digital maps. Figure 1 depicts the prototype of the type of project students could create using OSM and uMap. At first, I was a little intimidated because I had minimal to no experience with coding or geographic information systems (GIS). I came to understand OSM as a Wikipedia of digital mapping and it more closely aligned with my pedagogical praxis because of its stance against monopolizing and economically capitalizing geographic data and platforms. OSM is licensed under the Open Data Commons Open Database License (ODbL) and uMap is licensed under the Do What the F*ck You Want to Public License (WTFPL) allowing us full flexibility to use both digital platforms as needed for the course.
uMap has a “help” option to assist with coding to alter text and insert images. There are many customizable options that provide opportunities to develop students’ digital literacy skills. Students become familiar with different commands to communicate their ideas. As depicted in Figure 2, users can change different properties such as colors and symbols of the map markers. Students become familiar with a range of digital color codes and practice identifying digital imagery for their projects.
Student writing can be added to the digital map, as depicted by Figure 3. Users can use the description dialog box to write and format text, activate hyperlinks, and add photos. The question mark icon above the description box opens a text formatting dialogue box with the code needed to generate the multimodal written component for the Learning CUNY History project.
Current Project Phase
After piloting the project with digital mapping for several semesters, students have successfully mapped the CUNY Digital History Archive, and several have also been able to create their own digital maps using OSM and uMap as end of semester multimedia research projects. Assessments provided at the end of the semester revealed that students have learned more about CUNY history, and several have commented that I should keep the digital mapping project because they think other students would “enjoy” or “love” the project. One student stated that I should “provide more detailed instructions on how to utilize the digital mapping program.” In response to this statement from a student and my own observations from integrating the digital mapping tool, I’ve started integrating shorter mapping activities throughout the semester as a way to scaffold different learning styles.
Now, the semester begins with a digital mapping activity identifying our favorite street food vendors as an introduction to OSM and uMap. Integrating this activity earlier in the semester allows ample time for scaffolding the learning of the digital mapping platforms. Spatial thinking occurs as students identify the geographical location for food vendors and search openly available resources for images that represent the small food business. This has turned out to be an extraordinary opportunity and instructional method for developing a sense of community within the course. Students often respond to different points on the map and share experiences with each other about the data. A student once suggested that we all visit one of the mapped businesses to bond outside of our course-session times. Another student commented, “[The mapping activity] allows me to see [a lot] of different Latino places and feel comfort knowing my community is so big!” Both students demonstrated stronger bonds to their peers in ways that may not have occurred had we not activated this mapping activity. Once students have practiced and are able to place points confidently and independently on their own map using the digital mapping tools, we move to the CDHA with the intention of mapping its contents.
In this last semester implementing the project, we turned to CUNY’s current Learning Management System (LMS), Blackboard, to record all the entries written for the Learning CUNY History project, as discussion forum threads. By doing this, students can secure their writings in case any technical difficulties emerge with the digital map. I’ve learned that students sometimes accidentally delete their work or encounter different types of errors that prevent them from adding content to their uMap. Using the LMS provides students a reliable space to learn from one another through discussion forums. This work can easily be copied and pasted into the digital maps when all technical issues are resolved.
Findings
In this section I return to student testimonies about the Learning CUNY History project. As the project developed to include digital mapping, students have explicitly demonstrated an affective connection to the history of their university. At times students wrote statements demonstrating this affective relationship, as shared below. Findings also reveal that students make important and critical connections between their own lives and the items within the CDHA, demonstrating personal reflections that motivate them in the learning process. For example, a student chose “The Fight for Asian American Studies at Hunter College” collection and chose the item “Letter from Dr. Gary Okihiro to Hunter President Jennifer J. Raab.” This student wrote, “It shows the system has come a long way. When this was written, the [Asian American Studies] program was in danger. Now, though, I know that Hunter is one of ~10 colleges in the U.S. that has something called the Chinese Flagship program that is funded by the federal government…as a New Yorker…it makes me realize that maybe NYC hasn’t always been as inclusive as I thought. It opened my eyes and made me realize that even schools here once struggled to have programs that paid attention to the experiences of those from other cultures.” This student engages in a critical spatial analysis that allows them to transcend time to evaluate, assess, infer, and explain the historical event. The student was interested in pursuing a major in Asian American studies and their interaction with the archival items intensified their interest in doing so after realizing the collective effort from decades ago to develop the field of study.
As previously noted, the Learning CUNY History project can be used for courses from different disciplines. A student majoring in bilingual education chose the “Oral History with Antonio ‘Tony’ Nadal” item and wrote, “It gives us a glimpse into the hard work that went into creating a new department that focuses on studying history that reflects the students themselves. Many times, we take things for granted and do not realize that it took many people's hard work to make something accessible to us in the present. As a bilingual educator, knowing this history is empowering and inspiring.” This reflection created the opportunity for the in-service teachers of the course to engage in a discussion recognizing their own potential as educators and identify ways they too can sustain the movements for equity and representation stemming from the 1960s and 70s.
Figure 4 represents an example of the Learning CUNY History project. It shows a collective mapping of the CUNY Digital History Archives, with markers generated by students. Students often find items within the archive that extend beyond the Brooklyn College campus. A goal moving forward as the project continues to grow is to categorize the archival items by color-coding the markers. Eventually, students will also be able to use one uMap across semesters, so students can build on each other’s work.
Figure 5 depicts an end of semester photo essay project. This student chose to use digital mapping as a form of communication for their presentation. Incorporating digital mapping for their final projects was optional and this student gave us all an excellent example of a way to grow the Learning CUNY History project into a semester-long project that extends beyond the CDHA, maximizing the potential for different curricula from a variety of disciplines.
Limitations
A critical assessment of this project reveals contradictions and limitations of infusing digital technology into a publicly funded university. Members of the diverse student body where I teach may not have access to digital and/or computer technologies. We as professor-facilitators should not make assumptions about the level of technical knowledge students enter our course with (hooks 2014). Even when students have access to technologies the digital tools may be outdated or of inadequate quality. Recognizing this as a varied learning curve within the course, I aim to use digital tools that are accessible through a cell phone or campus computer borrowing system; have no cost required for their use; can be introduced and taught during a short session of scaffolded instruction with minimal disruption to the overall course goals; and have an opt in/out option to be publicly published since some students may want to make their work openly available.
My familiarity with digital technologies is also a limitation to be considered. There are times when I am unable to fix error messages, affecting the ability of students to produce a marker on the map. My current role as a graduate teaching fellow and adjunct instructor limits my ability to develop a course or adjust the course description to alert students, prior to enrolling, that we will be utilizing digital technologies to complete course projects and assignments. This limits the integration of digital tools since students enrolling into the course may not be interested or prepared to explore digital tools. It’s also good practice to limit introducing digital tools to one per semester, or per course I teach to limit confusion and maximize learning potential. Another digital tool I have explored to activate archival materials is Timeline JS by knight lab, an open-source tool that enables anyone to build visually rich, interactive timelines.
Some students don’t want to engage with technologies. In these situations, students are offered an option to opt in or out of using digital tools and are instead offered alternative exams, or research papers using the same rubric and expectations for the digital mapping projects. I also reserve time during the start of the semester to scaffold a “how to” for using digital archives and digital mapping tools in an effort to encourage any student that may feel intimidated by the inclusion of digital tools. The outcome is for students to finish our course with new digital skills and the confidence to use digital technologies and strategies to continue their academic journey toward graduation.
I’ve been reminded by colleagues that not every college or university has access to an archive or primary documents related to their campus’s history. I envision an opportunity to motivate the creation of such missing archives and/or invite creative remixes of the project to locate items and materials through archives at adjacent libraries, museums, or community-based and created initiatives as a response to the void. While I vehemently believe the CUNY digital archives can be used for courses outside of the CUNY system, as the items document NYC and national historical events, I also encourage educators to consult with archivists and librarians at their institutions or local libraries to identify archival materials that may align more closely with their own course descriptions. I have also developed a list of curated collections of archives on the CUNY Academic Commons, Items & Objects, that educators may find useful to remix the components of the project.
Concluding Remarks
I continue to build on my own expertise with the mapping programs and plan to continue growing the project. Evaluation of the pilot study included participant observation notes and although other forms of assessment, including final grades, attendance reports, and completion of course requirements indicate that students have a positive relationship to the digital tools thereby increasing the chances of graduating from the college, further research and a more reliable survey given to students is needed to support this hypothesis more concretely. Implementation of the project into other courses from a variety of disciplines will also provide expanded insights about the impact on students’ academic outcome.
The Learning CUNY History project can—and should be—edited for use by members of the CUNY community beyond students and their coursework. It can be integrated into staff and faculty trainings, used for student affairs as project-based and experiential learning methods for student activities. Student governments, clubs, and initiatives can also use the project as a model to understand the institution they are a part of more deeply. And most importantly, the Learning CUNY History project has potential to inform and impact communities beyond the borders of campus buildings and into the communities surrounding CUNY’s 25 colleges.
