Collaboration First by RI Council for the Humanities

COLLABORATION FIRST A Design + Humanities Lab

Report on Scheinfeldt Catalyst Residency | June 8-12, 2015 1

Catalyzing Newport is made possible with the generous support of Van Beuren Charitable Foundation Rhode Island Council for the Humanities

Catalyst Tom Scheinfeldt visited Newport in June 2015. The following report summarizes his experiences, charts the outcomes of his residency, and focuses on the results of the Design + Humanities lab he facilitated with the local action team. Catalyzing Newport Steering Committee International Tennis Hall of Fame Newport Art Museum Newport Restoration Foundation The Preservation Society of Newport County Redwood Library & Athenaeum Rhode Island Historical Society Salve Regina University

Table of Contents

CATALYZING NEWPORT

DESIGN + HUMANITIES LAB: COLLABORATION FIRST

Expertise: Catalyst Tom Scheinfeldt PhD

Impact Areas: Digital Culture, Cultural Entrepreneurship

Immersion Activities Local Action Team

Results

Essay: Design + Humanities

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Imagine a city whereâ&#x20AC;Ś

thought leaders across diverse fields convene and facilitate dialogues to explore important questions and address societal challenges. If the people of Rhode Island conclude that ‘free for all’ individualism must give way to more cooperation, more balance and sharing, more planning in economic, political, and social affairs, the state may be on the brink of a major shift in its patterns of thought and behavior. In that breakthrough may be Rhode Island's, and the nation's, real ‘Hope.’ bill mcloughlin

Rhode Island: A History, 1986

THE CHALLENGE

DAY 1

expertise

VISTING CATALYST

impact areas URBAN GROWTH & ECONOMY

immersion

activities

DIGITAL CULTURE

STEERING COMMITTEE

Lectures

& Forums

for Public

Workshops with Local Action Team

CULTURAL ENTREPRENEURSHIP

DIVERSITY & PROSPERITY

LOCAL ACTION TEAM

One-on-one Meetings

Tours

DAY 7 THE RESULTS

Seed Grants 8

Experiments

Connections

Catalyzing Newport

Catalyzing Newport has been incredibly valuable. It is critical for us to know what everyone else is doing, and this is the only forum where this is occurring. ____ trudy coxe, President and CEO

The Preservation Society of Newport County

WHAT IS CATALYZING NEWPORT? Catalyzing Newport is an initiative to provoke ideas, connections and outcomes to support a more resilient and prosperous Newport. Based on the core belief that history matters for Newport now, Catalyzing Newport’s network of leaders are developing innovative and substantive ways to engage with the city’s storied places and ideas in order to achieve significant outcomes. These include: – the City will be better able to make PROGRESS on key challenges – the organizations dedicated to preserving, exhibiting, interpreting Newport’s history will be more RESILIENT – Newport and Rhode Island’s civic identity will be STRONGER. At the heart of Catalyzing Newport is a steering committee of the leaders of seven historical, cultural, and educational organizations working together to create a shared vision of Newport. The initiative’s catalyst model draws on the extensive experience, national and international networks, and creative excellence of established experts (known as “catalysts”) to engage Newport communities in meaningful exchanges. Each visiting catalyst is paired with a team of local practitioners (known as the “local action team”). The local action team is devised specifically for each residency and works intensively with their catalyst to design an experiment which they prototype in Newport after the catalyst leaves. Visiting catalysts are selected based on their expertise related to Catalyzing Newport’s Impact Areas: Cultural Entrepreneurship, Diversity & Prosperity, Urban Growth & Economy, and Digital Culture. Identified by the steering committee as the main collaborative opportunities among Newport’s historical and cultural institutions, these impact areas focus the initiative’s planning and activities. Making progress in these areas requires long-term visioning, discovery, and experimentation, as well as cross-sector and intra-organization relationship building. We recognize that Catalyzing Newport is just one of many efforts focused on issues of long-term sustainability and resiliency in Newport. Together, we imagine a Newport whose future is rich in culture, civic life, and economic opportunities.

Design + Humanities Lab

Collaboration First ď&#x201A;&#x2122;

Touba Ghadessi @ToubaGhadessi: Real knowledge is interdisciplinary knowledge. Real knowledge calls on us to collaborate. Yes. @foundhistory @rihumanities @CatalyzingNwpt 2015/06/09

Expertise Visiting Catalyst

TOM SCHEINFELDT, PhD | University of Connecticut Tom Scheinfeldt, PhD, is Associate Professor and Director of Digital Humanities in the Digital Media Center at the University of Connecticut. He brings more than a decade of leadership in digital humanities research and management. Scheinfeldt has directed several award-winning digital humanities projects, including THATCamp, Omeka, and the September 11 Digital Archive. With a bachelor’s degree from Harvard and master’s and doctoral degrees from Oxford, Scheinfeldt has written and lectured extensively about the history of museums and the role of history in culture. Scheinfeldt is a recent contributor to Debates in Digital Humanities (University of Minnesota Press) and coeditor of Hacking the Academy (University of Michigan Press). He blogs about digital humanities and the business of digital humanities at Found History and co-hosts the Digital Campus podcast with his colleagues. Scheinfeldt was selected as a catalyst because of his extensive experience and innovations with public history and digitization efforts. As a “happy accident,” we discovered along the way that Scheinfeldt’s newest initiatives are centered on collaboration and redesigning the role of public historians in community problem solving. As much as we needed Scheinfeldt’s expertise, he was also interested in Catalyzing Newport’s developing model and its efforts to put the city’s renowned historical organizations, leaders, and cultural assets at the forefront of community conversations about Newport’s development and prosperity.

Impact Areas

DIGITAL CULTURE

Sustaining and growing cultural communities in a hyper-connected world. An examination of how data in our collections is preserved, stewarded, shared, used, and potentially monetized.

THE THEME | Collaboration First In June 2015, Scheinfeldt visited Newport, RI to explore a pressing and emerging theme in the cultural sector – Collaboration First. Using this theme as a guide, Scheinfeldt engaged various audiences during his week-long residency, including Catalyzing Newport’s steering committee in one-on-one meetings; members of the local action team in an intensive twoday workshop; a team of collections and archival colleagues implementing Newportal (a collaborative, cross-institution digital collections tool); and members of the general public at a lecture held at Salve Regina’s Ochre Court. These conversations explored ideas and options for moving the dial on a local challenge: How can we work together to increase scholarly and public access to Newport’s renowned and sometimes hidden historical assets and collections?

CULTURAL ENTREPRENEURSHIP

Leveraging the best cultural practitioners and innovators to explore how the cultural sector can use entrepreneurial approaches to support and help transform communities and to produce new models of economic and social impact. 14

THE CHALLENGE Scheinfeldt’s residency had a specific goal. He was charged with facilitating a workshop with the local action team that would result in the creation of a new request for proposals, or RFP, to inspire scholarly engagement with Newport across a variety of themes and challenges. The resulting RFP, (re)Newport (see page 23), was born out of the local action team’s Design + Humanities workshop with Scheinfeldt, but it was also informed by conversations and ideas generated throughout the week.

Immersion Activities

After listening to the Newportal presentation, my staff and I decided to hold off on investigating a new digital archive solution for the Tennis Hall of Fame’s collections; instead, we will plan to join Newportal. ____ douglas stark, Museum Director

Tennis Hall of Fame

SETTING IN MOTION NEW IDEAS A new Ethos | Collaboration First! In his lecture titled “Collaboration First,” Scheinfeldt laid out a vision where collaboration is a means to saving resources and finding efficiencies toward larger goals. Collaboration is often not thought about until an idea or project is fully formed. Partners are typically brought in at the end of the brainstorming phase to assist with implementation. However, Scheinfeldt’s work and research questions this paradigm and posits that scholars and organizations should seek collaborative partners in the exploration and discovery phase of their project development. This allows for more authentic collaboration as partners form relationships necessary to address larger challenges. Engaging in early collaboration can be difficult for the parties involved for several reasons: it relinquishes control; it is riskier because the outcomes are unknown; it requires more time investment; and it requires a lot of trust. For these reasons, many organizations continue to work in silos. So why do it? Why change practice when it’s fraught with difficulties and risk?

There are no shortcuts to solving community and societal issues. Catalyzing Newport values the “collaboration first” ethos, and in fact, Scheinfeldt’s lecture reaffirmed our own process. No one organization, foundation or visionary can solve our grand challenges alone. Even operating at a smaller scale, no one organization has the assets and resources to effectively interpret our complex, interconnected, and interdisciplinary stories. We need collaborators from all sectors, disciplines, staffing ranks, etc. to make sense of the world around us – and to help us engage new audiences and create new opportunities for humanities scholarship.

Immersion Local Action Team

The following individuals were selected to join Scheinfeldt’s local action team, not only for their expertise but for their qualities of being open-minded, entrepreneurial and team-oriented. The group represented different positions and seniority within their institutions to promote coordination across organizations and build leadership.

SHAWN BADGLEY | Rhode Island Historical Society Shawn is the Communications & Digital Outreach Coordinator at the Rhode Island Historical Society, where he applies his experience in media, politics, and content marketing to cultivate new audiences and engage longtime members.

MELISSA BARKER | City of Newport Melissa is GIS Coordinator in Newport’s Department of Civic Investment. Previously, Melissa worked on restoration projects around the US as a materials conservator and artist prior to returning to Aquidneck Island. Melissa received a BS in Historic Preservation from Roger Williams University’s School of Architecture in 2001, with a minor in History.

MARKUS BERGER | Rhode Island School of Design Markus is the Associate Professor and Graduate Program Director in the Department of Interior Architecture. He co-founded and co-edits Int|AR, the Journal on Interventions and Adaptive Reuse at RISD, that encompasses issues of preservation, conservation, alteration, and interventions.

MARISA ANGELL BROWN, PhD | Genie Loci

Marisa is founder and president for Genie Loci, a consulting and project design office based in Providence where she creates programs (analog, digital, and hybrid) that engage the public with architecture, landscape, and urban space. Marisa holds a PhD in architectural history from Yale University, an MA in history from the University of Chicago, and a BA from Princeton University.

AMBER CAULKINS | Association of Independent Colleges & Universities of Rhode Island Amber is the Director of Policy and Research for AICU Rhode Island where she researches, monitors, analyzes, and evaluates legislative and community issues that impactÂ AICU Rhode Island member institutions. Amber also leads The College & University Research Collaborative (The Collaborative), which serves to connect public policy and academic research for Rhode Island.

ď&#x201A;&#x2122; RI HistoricalSociety @RIHistory: Inspiring, divergent day talking digital humanities + cultural entrepreneurship w/ @CatalyzingNwpt Local Action Team led by @foundhistory 2015/06/11

MADELEINE ESCH | Salve Regina University Madeleine is Assistant Professor in the Department of English and Communications at Salve Regina Unviersity, where she teaches journalism and media studies. Her research focuses on consumer culture and gender in media, particularly in lifestyle television.

HOWARD NEWMAN | Newmans, Ltd. Fine Metal Restoration Howard is the founder of Newmans Ltd. Fine Metal Restorationand creator of the IP development firm, Sigma Surfacing LLC in 2011. Howard studied Architecture, Anthropology and Sociology at Miami University of Ohio. Howard received his BFA and MFA from the Rhode Island School of Design.

Participating in Catalyzing Newport’s local action team introduced me to important new people for my professional network in Rhode Island. I now feel confident reaching out to a whole new group of colleagues from across the state. ____ kaity ryan, Manager of Preservation Policy The Preservation Society of Newport County

STACIE M. PARILLO | Providence Public Library Stacie is Digital Producer at the Providence Public Library where she is responsible for maintaining and preserving digital collections. She also creates access to and showcases PPL’s various collections through online repositories and digital exhibits. She holds an MA in Communication Studies from Suffolk University, and an MS in Library & Information Science from Simmons College.

KAITY RYAN | Preservation Society of Newport County Kaity is Manager of Preservation Policy at the PSNC where she oversees the organization’s policy and advocacy efforts. She holds an MS in Historic Preservation from the Columbia University Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation, and a BA in Art History from Drew University.

ALYSSA SMITH | Worldways Social Marketing Alyssa is a communication advisor and social media coordinator, working on a number of municipal government and social service agencies, including the City of Newport. She is a graduate of the Harrington School of Communication at the University of Rhode Island.

The Sticky Notes Session

The last two days of Scheinfeldt’s residency were spent with the local action team and focused on solving the local challenge: How can we work together to increase scholarly and public access to Newport’s renowned and sometimes hidden historical assets and collections? Several topics garnered much discussion around the table:

____

Outlined here are some

CHALLENGES

of the key challenges and

– Unexplored and under appreciated histories – Social and financial barriers for low to moderate income residents of Newport – Geographical barriers, including concentration of historic properties in dense “cultural corridor” and separation of low to moderate income community from Newport’s waterfront – Urban innovation efforts not focused on “cultural corridor”

opportunities discussed with the catalysts in the brainstorming phase that informed the creation of their experiment.

OPPORTUNITIES – Access to authentic history – Beautiful natural and built environments – Historical working port city has been a center of exchange of ideas and commerce since its founding – Networks and connectivity – Innovation initiatives connected to authentic history – Active, engaged citizen scholars

The Results Seed Grants | Experiments | Connections

SETTING CHANGE INTO MOTION The RFP Emerges The resulting RFP, (re)Newport, was produced during the local action team’s workshop with Scheinfeldt and informed by conversations and ideas generated throughout the week. As part of their process to develop the RFP, the local action team reviewed some examples of national and international projects they felt were innovative in their examination of place. Inspiration projects included Block Island’s Glass Float project, Boston’s Participatory Chinatown, Washington, DC’s Union Station Tour app, NY’s Jewish Time Jump, and Library of Birmingham’s (UK) Dozens and Trails app. Some of these projects are physically and materially connected to a place, some are all digital, and some offer hybrid experiences. The models all share the goal of inspiring curiosity and adventurous learning about a place, and some even allow for citizens to join a conversation about a civic issue. They also interested the group as they were meant to be very active, participatory experiences that brought communities together in dialogue and exchange – which is a key goal of (re)Newport.

REQUEST FOR PROPOSALS: (RE)NEWPORT (RE)NEWPORT OVERVIEW: This RFP is a call for an immersive, participatory, locationbased “adventure” (for you to define!). (re)Newport’s goal is to expose Newport’s cultural treasures, its buildings and landscape, and its histories and myths, in an effort to build community, invigorate connections between and beyond the cultural sector, and spark curiosity and wonder. (RE)NEWPORT SCOPE: Successful projects will create a tool and/or a prototype to: • Creatively engage the collections and networks of all of the Catalyzing Newport institutions • Incorporate diverse locations across Newport including a mix of public, private, and semi-public places, indoor and outdoor spaces, and the waterfront • Engage Newport’s diverse communities, classes, races, and subcultures to promote civic engagement • Allow participants to shape their own experiences through physical and digital interactions • Acknowledge real or perceived loss and/or contested spaces or narratives • Produce tangible traces or artifacts that outlive the experience * Please keep in mind that this RFP is seeking a proof-of-concept that has the potential to be scaled up into a larger project. ELIGIBILITY: This pilot project is intended to encourage bold proposals. We seek creative and entrepreneurial scholars, artists, and techies from diverse disciplines, sectors, and career fields who will join a team to devise and implement the pilot vision. Suggested skills, traits, and approaches include: 1) problem solving 2) empathy 3) ability to work without hierarchy 4) collaboration 5) flexibility 6) sense of humor.

Essay

No one organization alone can

DESIGN + HUMANITIES | Kathleen Shannon

tackle the challenges presented by today’s dynamic and complex world. Problem solving today requires organizations to open their doors and nurture a dialogue with a diversity of experts in order to connect, create and act in ways that support a bold new future. ____ elizabeth francis, Executive Director Rhode Island Council for the Humanities

Design and humanities: we don’t often see these words together, but it’s a potentially powerful combination to address the challenges we face in an increasingly complex world. Often we think of “design” as an aesthetic or the last phase of development, i.e. the surface of a pretty product or packaging. But design really begins in the process of discovery and developing a concept for an idea, product, or solution. Humanities, moreover, are often associated with academic disciplines, e.g. History, Philosophy, Literature, Religion, etc., struggling for relevance in a technology-driven economy and increasingly STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math) focused educational system. This understanding misses both the qualities and the expertise engendered through the humanities: critical thinking, interpretation, expression, connection, context, empathy, and more. The humanities are valuable not only because they connect us to the past but because they contribute to forward-looking endeavors. Fundamentally, design and humanities thinking – their methods and understanding of experiences and human behavior that shape us and our future – are essential in any approach to discovery, whether it be health, economic inequality, urban vitality, or access to education. But why should we integrate design and humanities in practice? Bringing design and humanities together challenges the current expectations and environment for research, which create silos rather than connections and impede progress on significant challenges in, for example, education, the environment, and civic understanding. At the same time, there is widespread recognition that we must overcome these barriers; many federal agencies, corporations, and foundations are searching for new approaches to research that connect disciplines to understand problems and opportunities, tackle major challenges, and accelerate solutions.

Design and humanities have come together most clearly in the field of digital humanities. The digital environment has made it possible to connect disciplines and sectors on a large scale, going beyond just the ability to access more information and to collect more data. Digital humanities have shown us that researchers need access to collaborators who can help them think creatively about questions, problems, and approaches. Design + Humanities provides a way for researchers to understand context, devise applications, and forecast impact. Catalyzing Newport anticipates that this process can also be used to connect researchers, professionals, and engaged citizens across sectors, e.g., historians, cultural innovators and artists, legislators, policy makers, health professionals, educators, preservationists and conservationists, tourism professionals, business developers and manufacturers, and urban planners. Seeded with Scheinfeldtâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s visit, the core value of bridging Design + Humanities will drive future Catalyzing Newport activities.

ď&#x201A;&#x2122; Stacie Parillo @stacieparillo: Younger people collaborate better because they have less to lose. #catalyzingnewport 2015/06/09

Acknowledgments

Catalyzing Newport Steering Committee

Collaboration First Local Action Team

Chelsea Buffington, Salve Regina University

Shawn Badgely, Rhode Island Historical Society

Trudy Coxe, The Preservation Society of Newport County

Melissa Barker, City of Newport

Terry Dickinson, The Preservation Society of Newport County

Markus Berger, Rhode Island School of Design

Norah Diedrich, Newport Art Museum

Marisa Angell Brown, Genie Loci

Morgan Grefe, Rhode Island Historical Society

Amber Caulkins, Association of Independent Colleges & Universities of Rhode Island

Benedict Leca, Redwood Library & Athenaeum Pieter Roos, Newport Restoration Foundation

Madeleine Esch, Salve Regina University

Doug Stark, International Tennis Hall of Fame

Howard Newman, Newmans, Ltd. Fine Metal Restoration Stacie Parillo, Providence Public Library

Catalyzing Newport Project Team

Kaity Ryan, The Preservation Society of Newport County

Elizabeth Francis, Rhode Island Council for the Humanities

Alyssa Smith, Worldways Social Marketing

SueEllen Kroll, Rhode Island Council for the Humanities

Kathleen Shannon, Kathleen A. Shannon, LLC

Thank you to the following for their support and involvement

Catalyzing Newport Advisors

John Nicholas Brown Center for Public Humanities at Brown University

Paul Carroll, City of Newport

Deborah Linnell, van Beuren Charitable Foundation

Maureen Cronin, Worldways Social Marketing

Elizabeth Lynn, van Beuren Charitable Foundation Newportal Collaborative Tom Scheinfeldt, University of Connecticut Scott Zeman, Salve Regina University

THE VALUE AND VALUES OF CATALYZING NEWPORT A Springboard for Conversation, Commitment, and Action Catalyzing Newport encourages those who are inspired by our forums and conversations to engage more fully with us through dialogue, attendance at our events, and via direct participation in one of our catalysts’ visits. Below are some of the core values we find helpful in guiding our work in Newport. We invite you to carry these over to your own community-based projects. ENGAGE early and often. Allow for a diversity of input and participation early in your process to garner community buy-in.

COLLABORATION will expand possibilities. But it requires openness to different approaches and to change. NURTURE systems leaders. Support intra-organization and cross-sector relationships at all levels.

What we are Learning so Far – Activating new voices builds momentum for change – Increasing access to public/private spaces enhances civic life and engagement –Connecting across organizations provides leadership opportunities for staff – Attracting talent and scholars requires access, innovation, and opportunities –Creating an authentic, state-of-the-art tourism experience lifts everyone up – Unifying Newport’s history leads to inspiring the future

FOR MORE INFORMATION catalyzingnewport.org | sue@rihumanities.org  Follow us @CatalyzingNwpt