Archiving, Documenting, and Disseminating the History of the Clarence Fitzroy Bryant College

Abstract

The Clarence Fitzroy Bryant College is a pivotal institution in the Federation of St. Kitts and Nevis. It is the only indigenous tertiary level institution in the Federation and was a primary post-independence establishment intended to provide the manpower for the developing country (which is the smallest independent nation in the Western Hemisphere) for economic development. The Federation gained independence from Britain in 1983 and the College was established in 1988. Policy makers envisaged an institution that would provide training for middle managers, build human resource expertise in different sectors of the economy, and offer first year university courses in collaboration with the University of the West Indies. There is no systematic documentation of the history of the establishment or impact of the Clarence Fitzroy Bryant College, and the risk that this history could be lost is high, as the policymakers and others involved are of advanced age or deceased.

Libraries are committed to preservation, including preservation of institutional knowledge and community histories, because we recognize the importance of these histories to communities and the cultural and scholarly record. Large institutions like Indiana University have the staff and resources for collecting, organizing, preserving and making accessible, records “documenting the institution’s origins and development and the activities and achievements of its officers, faculty, students, alumni and benefactors.” However, many smaller institutions do not have the resources to collect and preserve these histories for posterity. A collaborative research grant will facilitate a partnership between IU Bloomington Libraries and the Clarence Fitzroy Bryant College (the College or CFBC) in St. Kitts and Nevis to research, document and build a digital history of the College, and use this collaboration as a case study to propose a model for collaboration between institutions of different sizes and resource levels.