{"683112":{"#nid":"683112","#data":{"type":"news","title":"Georgia Tech Students Help Illuminate Coffee County\u2019s History","body":[{"value":"\u003Cp\u003EGeorgia Tech students played a pivotal role in the award-winning Coffee County Memory Project, an oral history initiative that preserves the stories of school desegregation in rural Georgia.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003ELaunched in 2016, the project was supported by the Institute\u2019s Sustainable Communities Summer Internship Program, run by the Center for Serve-Learn-Sustain (now the \u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/scre.research.gatech.edu\/\u0022\u003ECenter for Sustainable Communities Research and Education\u003C\/a\u003E), in which students work full time with community partners across Atlanta and Georgia.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EBeginning in 2017, trusted advisers contributed to the success of this work, including \u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/www.britannica.com\/biography\/Vernon-E-Jordan-Jr\u0022\u003EVernon E. Jordan Jr.\u003C\/a\u003E, \u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/iac.gatech.edu\/people\/person\/63944bd6-2568-50f1-bea8-f6a16a57344c\u0022\u003EChristopher Lawton\u003C\/a\u003E, \u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/www.linkedin.com\/in\/ann-mccleary-07212237\/\u0022\u003EAnn McCleary\u003C\/a\u003E and \u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/ce.gatech.edu\/directory\/person\/g-wayne-clough\u0022\u003EG. Wayne Clough\u003C\/a\u003E. Clough, who served as Georgia Tech\u2019s president from 1994 to 2008, long advocated for public service, community-engaged research, and interdisciplinary teaching and learning.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EIn 2019, Georgia Tech students and participating interns Brice Minix and Nabil Patel combed through decades of local newspapers, digitized school board records, and conducted interviews with community members who lived in Coffee County during desegregation. In 2020, Kara Vaughan Adams and Bennett Bush transcribed countless interviews. Samina Patel\u2019s contributions in 2020 and 2021 included graphic and web design.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EAll their work laid the foundation for two virtual museum exhibits:\u202femergingVOICES of Coffee County\u202fand\u202fOvercoming Segregation: A Journey Through Coffee County\u2019s Forgotten Stories.\u202fThe latter received the 2023 Award of Excellence from the American Association of State and Local History. Further recognition came this year when the project earned the 2025 Georgia Association of Museums\u2019 Special Project Award for the PLAYBACK \u0026amp; FASTFORWARD seminar series.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003ET. Cat Ford, Project Director said, \u201cThe Serve-Learn-Sustain interns we partnered with from Georgia Tech were all graduates of Coffee High School. Their efforts turbo-charged our work\u2014not only because they worked tirelessly but also because, as they preserved their own history, they offered valuable insights into their lived experience of this legacy.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EClick here to learn more about \u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/scre.research.gatech.edu\/sustainable-communities-summer-internship-program\u0022\u003ESCoRE\u2019s Sustainable Communities Internship Program\u003C\/a\u003E.\u003C\/p\u003E","summary":"","format":"limited_html"}],"field_subtitle":"","field_summary":[{"value":"\u003Cp\u003EGeorgia Tech students played a pivotal role in the award-winning Coffee County Memory Project, an oral history initiative that preserves the stories of school desegregation in rural Georgia. Launched in 2016, the project was supported by the Institute\u2019s Sustainable Communities Summer Internship Program, run by the Center for Serve-Learn-Sustain (now the Center for Sustainable Communities Research and Education), in which students work full time with community partners across Atlanta and Georgia.\u003C\/p\u003E","format":"limited_html"}],"field_summary_sentence":[{"value":"Georgia Tech students received the 2023 Award of Excellence from the American Association of State and Local History for the Coffee County Memory Project "}],"uid":"27338","created_gmt":"2025-07-11 20:28:58","changed_gmt":"2025-07-14 15:50:36","author":"Brent Verrill","boilerplate_text":"","field_publication":"","field_article_url":"","location":"Atlanta, GA","dateline":{"date":"2025-07-11T00:00:00-04:00","iso_date":"2025-07-11T00:00:00-04:00","tz":"America\/New_York"},"extras":[],"hg_media":{"677403":{"id":"677403","type":"image","title":"AASLHAwardCeremony-Brice-Minix-2023_sized.jpg","body":"\u003Cp\u003EGeorgia Tech student Bruce Minix accepts Award of Excellence from the American Association of State \u0026amp; Local History in September 2023.\u003C\/p\u003E","created":"1752265760","gmt_created":"2025-07-11 20:29:20","changed":"1752265760","gmt_changed":"2025-07-11 20:29:20","alt":"Georgia Tech student Bruce Minix accepts Award of Excellence from the American Association of State \u0026 Local History in September 2023.","file":{"fid":"261298","name":"AASLHAwardCeremony-Brice-Minix-2023_sized.jpg","image_path":"\/sites\/default\/files\/2025\/07\/11\/AASLHAwardCeremony-Brice-Minix-2023_sized.jpg","image_full_path":"http:\/\/hg.gatech.edu\/\/sites\/default\/files\/2025\/07\/11\/AASLHAwardCeremony-Brice-Minix-2023_sized.jpg","mime":"image\/jpeg","size":197943,"path_740":"http:\/\/hg.gatech.edu\/sites\/default\/files\/styles\/740xx_scale\/public\/2025\/07\/11\/AASLHAwardCeremony-Brice-Minix-2023_sized.jpg?itok=wBVTZ8E4"}}},"media_ids":["677403"],"groups":[{"id":"244191","name":"Brook Byers Institute for Sustainable Systems"},{"id":"1188","name":"Research Horizons"},{"id":"1280","name":"Strategic Energy Institute"}],"categories":[{"id":"194611","name":"State Impact"},{"id":"193157","name":"Student Honors and Achievements"},{"id":"8862","name":"Student Research"}],"keywords":[{"id":"188360","name":"go-bbiss"},{"id":"187915","name":"go-researchnews"}],"core_research_areas":[{"id":"194566","name":"Sustainable Systems"}],"news_room_topics":[],"event_categories":[],"invited_audience":[],"affiliations":[],"classification":[],"areas_of_expertise":[],"news_and_recent_appearances":[],"phone":[],"contact":[{"value":"\u003Cp\u003E\u003Ca href=\u0022mailto:jennifer.martin@research.gatech.edu\u0022\u003EJennifer Martin\u003C\/a\u003E, Assistant Director of Research Communications Services\u003C\/p\u003E","format":"limited_html"}],"email":["jennifer.martin@research.gatech.edu"],"slides":[],"orientation":[],"userdata":""}}}