Student Activism, Diversity and Inclusion Archival Collections at Purdue

Project STAND is an online clearinghouse where academic institutions can provide researchers a centralized access point to historical and archival documentation on the development and on-going occurrences of student dissent. Project STAND focuses on digital and analog primary sources that document the activities of student groups that represent the concerns of historically marginalized communities (e.g., African American, Latino, LGBTQ, religious minorities, disabled, etc.). STAND also highlights the work of faculty, staff, and administrators who advocate for or support student activism.

Purdue University Archives and Special Collections became a member of Project STAND in the fall of 2017.  A Purdue student serves on the Student Advisory Committee and helped create the Archiving Student Activism Toolkit.  The Purdue Archives submits collections pertaining to student protests and historically marginalized communities to Project STAND, to increase awareness of and use of these collections.  Our goal is to build rich collections of archival materials that capture the history of student dissent and the history of cultural and ethnic diversity at Purdue.

The Purdue Archives and Special Collections contains collections pertaining to student activism including underground newspapers, manuscript collections and university records from students, faculty and administrators. Many of the collections documenting marginalized communities come from the campus cultural centers.  Material extends from the 1960s to the present day.  We thrive to expand our holdings of historical collections to cover any time period of Purdue history, including documenting and capturing history in the making.