Phase 1 (Pre-Visit Prep): Finding Aids 

  1. What is your research question: Student mental health 
  1. Description of materials: I could not find any passages for students’ mental health or just mental health in general as well.  
  1. What to look for: I think the archives would have helped in to see how certain students years ago dealt with their mental health with balancing school and their personal life.  

Phase 2: Working in the Archives  

  • Citation info: Mayor Alvin G. Fields Collection, Acc.#M71:01, Box 1 or 13, Beautification Committee, 1958-1968 
  • Inventory: Mayor Raymond reply letter to Mayor Alvin G. Fields and the meeting minutes from Mayor Raymond  
  • Subject: The letter discussed from Mayor Raymond to Mayor Alvin was how he does not work on the weekend and has that set aside spending time with his family.  
  • Creator/Audience: Louisa H. Bowen University Archives and Special Collections. The audience of the beatification committee of East St. Louis. 
  • Tone: The passion of wanting to make East St. Louis structure better led to a lot of anger, frustration, and racism too.  
  • Connection: The complaint in the file is still relevant today and still needs some rebuilding in the community.  

Phase 3: Reflection  

This reflection is about the visit to the Archive visit we found that sources could have shed light with my research question dealing with student’s mental health. A lot of college students over the years’ experience mental health differently when it comes with having to find a good balance between school, work, and even time for themselves. A lot of college students a couple of years ago normally did not express or even show anything that they were going through because a lot of the students our age do it a lot. Which it was common throughout the years to just keep everything to themselves and still push through with their work. The voices and the experiences of the students are being told throughout the years with everyone experiencing something different or even going through something different between each other. 

For the Archives was for Louisa H. Brown University and even the people of East St. Louis. The black people living in the community of East St. Louis got silenced a lot over the time. Going through the different information that was in the box made me feel like a researcher because having to just read through everything and getting an understanding of the information that is being provided. The group that I were in was discussing the different things that we found in the box and even when it came to just discussing it as well. Yes, we did look at the documents differently and talk to each other about what we think the documents meant. All the information that we saw was also helpful as well with seeing how much the people of color in East St. Louis went through when it came to the listening to them and trying to make the community better.