Full Notification

The National Institute for Museum and Library Services announced last week the award of a $495,000 grant to the Santa Ana Public Library for its program, Memories of Migration. The grant was awarded as part of the Institute’s National Leadership – Demonstration Grant program, which supports projects that address challenges faced by libraries across the United States.

“This grant enables the City of Santa Ana’s Public Library to create programs and practices that will vastly improve library services nationwide. The Memories of Migration program allows our youth to participate in recording oral history and at the same time provides them with technologically advanced workforce experience,” said Mayor Pro Tem Sal Tinajero.

Lead by the Santa Ana Public Library and the Webby-award winning non-profit Historypin project, Memories of Migration is a three-year community memory program that builds on the Library’s unique Teen Historian program to jump start the development of cultural heritage collections around the shared stories of human migration in America. Techniques developed by the library will be tested in model programs operated by four libraries and agencies that serve new immigrant communities in four different states, including New York, New Mexico, Connecticut and California.

“Our unique TeenSpace program continues to set the standard for other programs across the Country,” said Executive Director of Parks & Recreation Gerardo Mouet. “This grant will allow the Santa Ana Public Library to capitalize on our very successful Teen Historian program and the Seeds to Trees youth workforce program giving our youth increased access to cutting edge technology and skills that can be applied immediately in their future making the library a dynamic place to learn and contribute.”

Queens Library (Queens, NY), West Hartford Public Library, (West Hartford, CT), the State of New Mexico Department of Cultural Affairs and New Mexico Highlands University (Las Vegas, NM) will join the Santa Ana Public Library in offering their immigrant communities a voice in the growth of their shared stories of new lives lived in a new country. Their teen sons and daughters will be trained to collect oral histories and other information that will provide the bridge that brings these stories to life in a digital world through Historypin. The noted international web presence will provide a home for the stories and the digital infrastructure that make them available to all. An additional partner in the progam, Project GADO, will provide teens training in the use of scanning robots that will facilitate the digitization of the histories, while another, Orange County Reforma, will organize a local conference on Latino history to kick off the information collection process.

Over the next three years, the Santa Ana Public Library, its six library and organization partners, Historypin, and the Institute for Museum and Library Services look forward to bringing the experiences of our immigrant communities to life, and helping other communities to do the same.

THE SANTA ANA PUBLIC LIBRARY IS LOCATED AT:
26 CIVIC CENTER PLAZA (corner of Civic Center and Ross)

-End-