The History Department typically hires four student workers each academic year to work as Office Assistants. These students perform a variety of tasks and are an intregal part of the department and great support to the faculty and staff. To put it simply, their presence and hard work keeps the department running smoothly! Most students who seek this position are History majors, but it is not a requirement. In Spring 2022, two of our student workers were invited to give presentations on their research papers at national conferences. Audrey Messinger (History Major-Class of 2023), attended the Indiana Association of Historians Annual Conference, and Madeline Shields (Art & SOAN Major-Class of 2023), traveled to Chicago with her classmates to present at the Midwest Sociological Society Conference.
Audrey Messinger
Student worker and History Major Audrey Messinger ’23 presented a paper at the Indiana Association of Historians Annual Conference on April 9, 2022, titled, “We Won’t Go Back Until Emerson is White: The Emerson School Strike of 1927 and The Press”. As an undergraduate Audrey knew the chances of being selected as a presenter were slim, but saw that her paper fit the conference theme of Rethinking Education and took a chance. Audrey said the real takeaway from the conference was making connections with attendees and meeting other historians. The keynote speaker, Dr. Emily Prifogle, University of Michigan, who spoke on “Rethinking the History of Rural Education”, came to Audrey’s presentation and invited Audrey to contact her regarding graduate school. Most attendees were excited about history in general and talked about ways to get younger people more engaged. Audrey encourages other undergraduates to look for smaller conferences and submit their work, saying “Go for it!” Overall, she found taking part in the conference to be a great opportunity and a rewarding experience.
Madeline Shields
Madeline Shields ’23, an Art and Sociology/Anthropology Major, recently took part in a research project through her course, SOAN 371, with Professor Ryan Sheppard. The purpose of the research was to analyze skills and development through student employment on campus. The class worked with The Piper Center and Human Resources to decide what to research and communicated with them on which questions would generate helpful and meaningful responses.
Madeline and her team created a survey that was sent to 2,249 St Olaf student workers and received a total of 557 responses. From there they analyzed the data, often surprised by the percentages of skill levels that students were learning through a wide variety of jobs across campus.
Twelve students accompanied Professor Sheppard to the Midwest Sociological Society (MSS) Conference on April 14-16, 2022, at the Swissotel in Chicago. Madeline enjoyed sharing her research in a professional setting, and seeing how attendees could relate her research to their own colleges and universities. She felt the best part of the conference was the interaction with other people in graduate school. Professors from other institutions were impressed with the level of research from the St Olaf students, given the fact they were undergrads. As a bonus to attending the conference, Madeline enjoyed the chance to “experience” the uniqueness of downtown Chicago.