Roots with Wings, a Floyd County Place-Based Education Project:: Intergenerational Connections

Floyd Story Center

Since 1998, a community oral history collection partnership of the Old Church Gallery, Ltd., Radford University’s Center for Social and Cultural Research, Honors Program, Scholar-Citizen Initiative, Appalachian Regional and Rural Studies Center, and Floyd County High School. Our archives now hold over 100 interviews.

In our Roots with Wings project, college mentors, high school staff, and community volunteers meet weekly during the school year to teach the discipline of oral history collection.


Students learn ethical, methodologically sound interview techniques, practice and complete several interviews, transcribe the audiotapes, create searchable content logs, archive interviewee resources and period photographs, learn the technology of audio and video recording, research historical backgrounds, acquire proficiency in iMovie and storytelling, and finally extract a theme from an hour long interview to create a seven minute movie production.

Thursday, January 24, 2013

Catherine Pauley's Project Introduction

Mrs. Myers' Communications Systems Class. The first oral history session, January 24, 2013, unexpectedly jump-started all of our collective creativity. The time slot, so carefully planned, hit a glitch. However, true Floyd ingenuity saved the day, and the high school place-based education project looks to be off and running beautifully. Here's the audio of the introductory talk given by Catherine Pauley today. It was an unvarnished lo-fi filming with a flip cam, but you should be able to appreciate her many wisdoms regardless of the audio variations. Thanks everyone!


Dr. Wagner's Radford University mentors' thoughts on the first day's experience:
POSTINGS FROM DAY 1, THURSDAY JANUARY 24, 2013

"[Floyd Story Center Community Partner], Catherine Pauley, calmed us by sharing a lovely story about her mother and giving all of us one of her mother’s rocks as a good luck charm. . . . I am also excited to teach the [high school students] everything that we learned last year [in the CORE 201 course that served as preparation for this course]." (Analise Roccaforte)

"I’m really interested in beginning work on this project, considering the fact that I’m from this area originally, and I like to think that I understand a little bit about the way of life down in this area of Virginia. I’m looking forward to being a mentor to these kids and really coming up with an awesome project, something they can be proud of, so they can graduate saying, I did that.” (Kenna Crane)

"Virginia Beach is a lot different from Floyd County and I have already begun to experience [the difference]. The story Ms. Pauley told us with the rock was the first time on Thursday that I realized how different things are going to be. . . . I think this project is going to definitely open my mind to places beyond my comfort zone, and I’m so excited for that." (Gabby DeMarco)

"When Mrs. Pauley began her story about her brother going to war and she and her mother not knowing what to do with their time to keep their minds off of the danger he was in, I was immediately captivated. . . . When Mrs. Pauley speaks it makes me want to sit and listen to her stories for hours! . . . I am more than excited to work with all the amazing people involved in this project! Next Thursday can't get here fast enough!" (Victoria Curtis)

"My evaluation of the project thus far is actually how important and meaningful the project is to everyone that has previously worked on it. Looking at what this project means to me [to begin with] is learning how the [World War II] Veterans are so willing to help the community. . . . I have always wanted to give back to the community, but never knew how. Now I know how I can give back and that is by helping these [high school] students learn the skills for success that we have learned." (Mike Barbour)

POSTSCRIPT: January 31st, our scheduled Thursday class, school was closed due to bad weather.

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