So Many Projects, So Little Time

Recently I’ve been going back and forth between a few different projects. I’ve been working hard trying to identify people in the digital photos from past Gettysburg College theatre productions in the GettDigital Theatre Arts collection. The staff taught me how to use the ContentDM program so that I can actually have the website show the names I’ve uncovered. I’ve been using yearbooks, alumni catalogs, and some of the staff from the Theatre Arts Department as resources. At the beginning I was making a lot of headway with identifying people; however, things are going a bit slower now and the people in the pictures are getting harder to identify. [excerpt

The Final Week!

I can’t believe that this upcoming week will be my last as a Fortenbaugh intern! While I am sad that this semester is coming to a close, I am also very aware of all I have left to complete. Abby and I have made great progress with our display. The creative process has been really rewarding for both of us, and I know that I personally have really enjoyed doing this as a partner project. We worked together to decide which fabric backdrop to use and we’re having a lot of fun moving the objects around to see where they fit and look best. It’s really interesting to think like a curator and try to think about how people will look at a display. What will they find most interesting? Where do we want to direct their attention first? These are all questions that we have to keep in mind as we work this upcoming week. [excerpt

MS-169: Albert Chance World War II Collection

This collection contains personal documents, correspondence, photographs, and items from Albert Chance during the time he served in WWII. His correspondence and photographic materials dominate the collection. While Chance’s materials give a thorough description of his personal experience during the war in the European Theater and North African Campaign, they also provide perspective into the mind of the common soldier during this time. Through his letters Chance expressed his feelings of commitment to the war effort, his opinions about the sites and people he saw while he was away, and what he did during his leisure time. Special Collections and College Archives Finding Aids are discovery tools used to describe and provide access to our holdings. Finding aids include historical and biographical information about each collection in addition to inventories of their content. More information about our collections can be found on our website http://www.gettysburg.edu/special_collections/collections/.https://cupola.gettysburg.edu/findingaidsall/1163/thumbnail.jp

MS-194: Richard Hutch \u2767 Papers

This collection consists primarily of materials produced by SCOPE for SCOPE participants, correspondence between Richard Hutch and various companions, and publications regarding civil rights. Though aspects of the collection extend beyond 1965, it focuses most heavily on Hutch’s SCOPE experience during the summer of 1965 and does not provide great detail on other civil rights organizations. The collection provides an overview of the role that SCOPE played in the larger Civil Rights Movement, as well as valuable insight to the individual experience of a participant in the Civil Rights Movement. While the collection includes materials from Hutch’s time at Gettysburg College, it does not provide strong representation of the attitude among the larger student body regarding civil rights. Most of the materials from Hutch’s undergraduate experience were written by him and reflect his own personal perspective on the Civil Rights Movement. Special Collections and College Archives Finding Aids are discovery tools used to describe and provide access to our holdings. Finding aids include historical and biographical information about each collection in addition to inventories of their content. More information about our collections can be found on our website http://www.gettysburg.edu/special_collections/collections/.https://cupola.gettysburg.edu/findingaidsall/1171/thumbnail.jp

Finished Processing First Collection!

Hello! On Tuesday I finally finished processing and organizing my first collection. On the left is my finished product, all labeled and organized. Processing this collection was a very enjoyable experience for me–I feel that I am the expert on this collection. Throughout the process it was sometimes difficult to know how to group some of the items. Certain things, like meeting minutes, are easy to group together. Some things like handwritten notes or various articles are more difficult to group. If the notes contain a wide variation in subject matter, it might be better to group them into several groups according to subject. However, if there are only a few pages of notes, it might be easier to group them together and indicate their subject matter on the folder in which they are placed. [excerpt

Vulnerable Youth: Background and Policies

[Excerpt] This report first provides an overview of the youth population and the increasing complexity of transitioning to adulthood for all adolescents. It also provides a separate discussion of the concept of “disconnectedness,” as well as the protective factors youth can develop during childhood and adolescence that can mitigate poor outcomes. Further, the report describes the evolution of federal youth policy, focusing on three time periods, and provides a brief overview of current federal programs targeted at vulnerable youth. (Table A-1, at the end of the report, enumerates the objectives and funding levels of such programs. Note that the table does not enumerate all programs that target, even in small part, vulnerable or disconnected youth.) The report then discusses the challenges of coordinating federal programs for youth, as well as federal legislation and initiatives that promote coordination among federal agencies and support programs with a positive youth development focus

Vulnerable Youth: Federal Mentoring Programs and Issues

[Excerpt] The purpose of contemporary, structured mentoring programs is to reduce risks by supplementing (but not supplanting) a youth’s relationship with his or her parents. These programs are administered by mostly adult volunteers who are recruited by youth serving organizations, faith based organizations, schools, and after school programs. Some of these programs have broad youth development goals, while others focus more narrowly on a particular outcome such as reducing gang activity or substance abuse, or improving grades. Research has shown that mentoring programs have been associated with some positive youth outcomes, but that the long term ability of mentoring to produce particular outcomes and the ability for mentored youth to sustain gains over time are less certain. Since the mid 1990s, Congress supported mentoring programs for the most vulnerable youth. The Department of Justice’s (DOJ’s) Juvenile Mentoring Program (JUMP), the first such program, was implemented in 1994 to provide mentoring services for at risk youth ages 5 to 20. Although there is no single overarching policy today on mentoring, the federal government has supported multiple mentoring efforts for vulnerable youth since JUMP was discontinued in FY2003. Previously, two mentoring programs the Mentoring Children of Prisoners (MCP) program and Safe and Drug Free Schools (SDFS) Mentoring program provided a significant source of federal funding for mentoring services. However, the programs were short lived: the MCP was administered by the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) from FY2003 through FY2011 and the SDFS program was administered by the Department of Education (ED) from FY2002 through FY2010. The federal government currently funds mentoring efforts through short term grants and initiatives, primarily carried out by DOJ. DOJ has allocated funding for multiple initiatives through its Mentoring program, including mentoring for certain vulnerable youth and research on mentoring. In addition, the federal government has provided funding to programs with vulnerable youth that have a strong, but not exclusive, mentoring component. Youth ChalleNGe, an educational and leadership program for at risk youth administered by the Department of Defense (DOD), helps to engage youth in work and school, and leadership opportunities. Adult mentors assist enrolled youth with their transition from the program for at least one year. Finally, federal agencies coordinate on mentoring issues. The Federal Mentoring Council was created in 2006 to address the ways agencies can combine resources and training and technical assistance to federally administered mentoring programs, and to serve as a clearinghouse on mentoring issues for the federal government. The council has been inactive since 2008. This report begins with an overview of the goals of mentoring, including a brief discussion on research of structured mentoring programs. The report then describes the evolution of federal policies on mentoring since the early 1990s. The report provides an overview of the federal mentoring initiatives that are currently funded. While additional federal programs and policies authorize funding for mentoring activities, among multiple other activities and services, such programs are not discussed in this report. The report concludes with an overview of issues that may be of interest to Congress. These issues include the limitations of research on outcomes for mentored youth, the quality of mentoring programs, and the potential need for additional mentors

Youth and the Labor Force: Background and Trends

[Excerpt] This report provides current and historical labor force information about young people ages 16 to 24. In general, youth have a lower rate of labor force participation, and those who are in the labor force are less likely to gain employment than older workers. Both labor supply and demand factors drive this pattern. On the labor supply side, young people are making greater investments in education by enrolling in and completing high school and college in greater numbers. They are less likely to be attached to the labor force due to their limited availability (e.g., only able to work full-time during the summer if they attend school) and their relatively weaker connections to employers. Labor demand also plays a role. Youth are less desirable in some ways than adult workers because they are less experienced; have fewer skills and education; and are potentially short-term hires, which can be costly to employers. The report focuses on trends from 2000 to 2018. This period has included two recessions (March to November 2001 and December 2007 to June 2009) and a decline in jobs requiring only a high school diploma. Many workers were still struggling to find work in the years immediately following the more recent recession. The recession exacerbated challenges that workers have faced in securing and retaining employment since 2000. Against this backdrop, young people ages 16 to 24 experienced their steepest decreases in labor force participation and employment; however, in recent years employment levels have steadily been recovering. Some studies have found that early labor market experiences and outcomes have lasting impacts on employability and wages. Given the current and future challenges that young people can experience in the labor market, this report may be of interest to Congress in the contexts of workforce development, education, unemployment insurance, youth policy, or macroeconomic policy; however, the report does not discuss specific programs or policy implications. The report begins with a brief discussion of current employment and education pathways that young people can pursue. Following this is a description of the labor market data used in the report, which includes the labor force participation rate, employment-population ratio, and unemployment rate.2 The report then discusses these data for the post-World War II period, with a focus on trends since 2000, comparing labor force outcomes based on age, sex, and race/ethnicity. The report concludes by exploring the factors that influence the extent to which youth participate in the labor force and their prospects for employment. The last section also discusses the potential short- and long-term effects of young people’s labor market experiences. The Appendix includes supplemental tables and figures on youth employment trends

Vulnerable Youth: Federal Mentoring Programs and Issues

[Excerpt] Since the mid-1990s, Congress has supported legislation to establish structured mentoring programs for the most vulnerable youth. The Department of Justice’s Juvenile Mentoring Program (JUMP), the first such program, was implemented in 1994 to provide mentoring services for at-risk youth ages 5 to 20. The purpose of contemporary, structured mentoring programs is to reduce risks by supplementing (but not supplanting) a youth’s relationship with his or her parents. Some of these programs have broad youth development goals while others focus more narrowly on a particular outcome such as reducing gang activity or substance abuse, or improving grades. Research has shown that mentoring programs have been associated with some positive youth outcomes, but that the long-term effects of mentoring on particular outcomes and the ability for mentored youth to sustain gains over time are less certain. Although there is no single overarching policy today on mentoring, the federal government has supported multiple mentoring efforts for vulnerable youth since JUMP was discontinued in FY2003. In recent years, two mentoring programs—the Mentoring Children of Prisoners (MCP) program and Safe and Drug Free Schools (SDFS) Mentoring program—have provided a significant source of federal funding for mentoring services. However, the programs were short- lived: funding for the MCP program, carried out by the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) since FY2003, was discontinued as of FY2011; and funding for the SDFS program, carried out by the Department of Education (ED) since FY2002, was discontinued as of FY2010. The federal government currently funds mentoring efforts through short-term grants and initiatives. Many of these grants are carried out by the Department of Justice (DOJ), which has allocated funding for multiple mentoring programs, including mentoring for certain vulnerable youth and research on mentoring. In addition, the federal government has provided funding to programs with vulnerable youth that have a strong, but not exclusive, mentoring component. Youth ChalleNGe, an educational and leadership program for at-risk youth administered by the Department of Defense, helps to engage youth in work and school, and leadership opportunities. Adult mentors assist enrolled youth with their transition from the program for at least one year. Finally, federal agencies coordinate on mentoring issues. The Federal Mentoring Council was created in 2006 to address the ways agencies can combine resources and training and technical assistance to federally administered mentoring programs, and to serve as a clearinghouse on mentoring issues for the federal government. The council has been inactive in recent years but federal agencies, including the Departments of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) and Justice, are collaborating to reconvene the council. This report begins with an overview of the purpose of mentoring, including a brief discussion on research of structured mentoring programs. The report then describes the evolution of federal policies on mentoring since the early 1990s. The report provides an overview of the federal mentoring initiatives that are currently funded. Note that additional federal programs and policies authorize funding for mentoring activities, among multiple other activities and services. These programs are not discussed in this report. The report concludes with an overview of issues that may be of interest to Congress. These issues include the limitations of research on outcomes for mentored youth, the potential need for additional mentors, grantees’ challenges in sustaining funding, and the possible discontinuation of federal mentoring funding. The Appendix includes a description of two federal mentoring programs that were funded until FY2010 and FY2011

Vulnerable Youth: Background and Policies

[Excerpt] This report first provides an overview of the youth population and the increasing complexity of transitioning to adulthood for all adolescents. It also provides a separate discussion of the concept of “disconnectedness,” as well as the protective factors youth can develop during childhood and adolescence that can mitigate poor outcomes. Further, the report describes the evolution of federal youth policy, focusing on three time periods, and provides a brief overview of current federal programs targeted at vulnerable youth. The report then discusses the challenges of coordinating federal programs for youth, as well as federal legislation and initiatives that promote coordination among federal agencies and support programs with a positive youth development focus