My spring 2026 internship at the Rockefeller Archive Center (RAC) transformed how I understand archives, not just as repositories of documents, but as tangible connections between the past and the people who preserve and learn from them.
I came in as a Political Science major and English minor at Brooklyn College, with two years of research fellowships behind me. I had fallen in love with research during my sophomore year, but I had always been on the receiving end of archival work. Reading the sources, never thinking much about who organized the material or why. When I spotted the RAC internship in my college newsletter, I wanted to find out what happens on the other side.
I started slowly, watching RAC 101 orientation videos about the RAC’s preservation strategies and security protocols. It was a low-pressure way to get my footing, and I really appreciated it, as it allowed me to introduce myself to the RAC, too. Once I settled in, the hands-on work came quickly.
The Audiovisual Inventory Project
My first major project, supervised by Audiovisual Archivist Brent Phillips, turned out to be the highlight of my internship. In high school, I created a multimedia project combining film, photography, and music to document women’s experiences during the 1971 Bangladeshi Liberation War, so working in the Preservation Lab with Brent felt like a natural extension of something I already cared deeply about. We talked about the specific challenges of preserving older film formats, watched reels on the Steenbeck, and had wide-ranging conversations about what film means for cultural memory. I inventoried D-2 films and 1-inch open reels, constantly surprised by the range and richness of what the RAC holds.
One afternoon, Brent and I watched a compilation put together by a photographer who had captured cultural events in 1920s Java (now Indonesia). What struck me most was learning that Indonesian village elders had been able to watch this footage of their own people, nearly a century old. Later that semester, the King of Mangkunegaran visited the RAC, along with members of the Indonesian consulate in New York, and we showed them the same footage. Watching them lean in, pointing at the dances and traditions on screen, and personally connecting to each aspect made everything Brent and I had talked about vividly real. I loved constantly being around material that holds so much worth for people and their communities.
The Culturally Competent Description Project
My second project involved creating Wikidata pages for nonprofit organizations, many of them being international, that had little to no existing online presence. It was quieter work, but meaningful. I thought about the researchers who would one day search for these organizations and actually find them, and how much that visibility matters for groups working toward change in parts of the world that don’t always make it into mainstream conversations.
The Community
The part of the internship I think about most isn’t a single project, it’s the people. I never once felt like an outsider. Every team member I encountered was genuinely welcoming, curious about my background, and happy to include me. Lunches, team meetings I was invited to sit in on, casual conversations in the hallway, or reshelving exhibit material, all of it added up to something I hadn’t expected: a real sense of belonging. My supervisor, Marissa Vassari, was an immense source of support during my time at the RAC, as well. What I understand now that I didn’t before is why archives attract the kind of people they do. The work asks you to care about everything, such as history, culture, technology, community, and access. It makes sense that the people drawn to it would be just as wide-ranging in their curiosity and warmth.
I feel genuinely lucky to have spent a semester in Sleepy Hollow at the RAC, and even luckier for the people I met along the way.