Religious Community History Seminar, Fall 2025

Are you part of a religious community with stories, records, and traditions waiting to be preserved? Join our fall 2025 seminar designed specifically for community historians and citizen archivists who want to learn how to care for and share their community’s history. Applicants should be a part of a religious community/congregation that has been active in Central Arkansas for several years. We will be accepting a wide range of faith traditions to be inclusive of a variety of religious backgrounds.

Led by Meredith Li (CALS DIY Memory Lab Coordinator) and Danielle Afsordeh (CALS Butler Center Community Outreach Archivist and Programs Coordinator), this three-part seminar series will equip you with essential archival skills, hands-on digitization experience, and digital storytelling tools. Whether you’re just getting started or deepening your preservation efforts, this program offers the resources and guidance you need to begin your archiving journey with a starter kit provided to each participant.

Program Overview

This in-person course spans three monthly evening sessions (2 hours each), hosted in the Community Room at CALS Fletcher Library—centrally located and easily accessible. You’ll also receive access to a private Discord server (with onboarding support) to connect with fellow participants and instructors between sessions.

Session Breakdown

All sessions will take place at the Fletcher Library Community Room, 823 N. Buchanan St., Little Rock, AR 72205. Because we are anticipating a wide variety of faith backgrounds, we may shift these dates to accommodate religious holidays that coincide with scheduled programming. If you have conflicts, please apply anyway. We will solidify dates to fit everyone in once the cohort has been identified. 

Session 1 – Preserving the History
Monday, August 18 | 6:00 – 7:30 PM
Explore how to preserve and organize your community’s historical records. Meredith Li and Danielle Afsordeh will introduce strategies for identifying significant materials, proper storage methods, and organizing records in a way that makes them searchable and usable.

Session 2 – Digitization and Preservation
Monday, September 15 | 6:00 – 7:30 PM
Learn how to digitize your materials using tools available through the CALS DIY Memory Lab. Li will guide you through scanning, file standards, description methods, and long-term preservation techniques.

Session 3 – Telling Your Congregation’s Story
Monday, October 20 | 6:00 – 7:30 PM
Discover how to share your history with the public. Afsordeh will introduce digital storytelling tools such as timelines, maps, and simple websites. Participants will also get hands-on guidance to draft a historical article for inclusion on a new digital project hosted on the Roberts Library website (and for use on a congregation website, if desired).

Program Features

• Resource Sharing:
  Each session is supported by curated reading materials and brief assignments to prepare you for meaningful participation.

• Cohort Model:
  We’re launching with a pilot cohort of up to 10 faith communities to ensure personalized support and representation from diverse traditions. Applications will be reviewed to ensure a balanced and engaged group.

• Lasting Impact:
  By the end of the program, each participant will produce:

  • An encyclopedia-style article about their faith community for a dedicated project website and other possible uses.

  • Links to digitized materials preserved via the Wayback Machine.

  • Connections to the CALS Butler Center and DIY Memory Lab to support ongoing archiving and collection development work.

• A New Shared Space:
  Build relationships across faith communities and form a collaborative environment—what we call a “third space”—where a shared commitment to memory and preservation thrives.

Ready to preserve your community’s story for generations to come?

Application deadline has been extended to July 8, 2025.
We will notify cohort members of their acceptance by July 15, 2025.

Email memorylab@cals.org with any questions about the program.