Insights From PCC Interns : Rochelle

This is my last day as an intern and in the past few weeks I've learned so much about what was happening on this campus and across the United States from the early to mid 1970s. This internship has also reinvigorated my interest in history and now I am considering pursuing degrees in either conservation or archival studies. 


For the past four to five weeks I've been digitizing campus newspapers from 1975-1976. I thought using the Zeutschel OS 12002 scanner would be way more complicated than it actually was. The Zeutschel is a very large and ominous looking machine that can handle digitizing large books and newspapers. During my second week of scanning Jamie discovered a more efficient way of scanning the newspapers that saved us so much time. I won't go into details but this discovery made me realize how important it is to keep track of new methods and decisions that are made during a Digitization project. It makes it easier for everyone involved and for those down the road. I also realized that there are going to be things you don't plan for like finding newspapers with missing pages, or newspapers with incorrect dates or newspapers that are in poor condition. I had to adapt quickly. While the classes I've taken at Pasadena City College have definitely prepared me for this internship there are certain things you can't prepare for. So you have to take things as they come and adjust accordingly.

Insights from PCC Interns: Rochelle

 My name is Rochelle and I am one of the Digitization Interns here at Special Collections. For the past few weeks I've been creating metadata for the 1973 issues of the University Times. The articles I've come across have been mostly political in nature and I've found it all very fascinating especially since many of the problems I came across then still resonate today.

There were a couple of stories that spanned more than a single article that caught my eye so it was difficult for me to choose just one. However, I did find the controversy surrounding teacher evaluations odd mostly because it's something that I've taken for granted. Yet during this time period  there was a lot of push back against them on this campus. I came across several articles that addressed fears about a student publication called "A Student's Guide to his Teachers" that consisted of teacher evaluations sold at the Trident Shop. The booklet of evaluations was created by the Underground Evaluation Committee of the School of Business and Economics.

I got a better sense of how the evaluations were perceived from Letter to the Editors. There were a number of professors who were against the evaluations because they believed that the statements found in the booklet were defamatory. There were also concerns that the students who participated in the surveys were anonymous. One professor, a Dr. Gene B. Tipton, wrote in a letter (August 3, 1973) addressed to the editor that if there was a publication called "Guide to Students" that many students on campus would be outraged. Dr. Tipton was concerned about the anonymity of the students and that the publication was sold. The latter concern led one student to write a letter to the editor in response.

 In the August 10, 1973 issue, a student by the name of Stephen L. Bloch wrote that students were often punished for speaking their minds. He thought that the evaluations showed that having a Ph.D doesn't mean that professors can teach well. He then challenged Dr. Tipton to present her own statistics that showed that many professors in the department were against the evaluations. I wasn't able to find a response from Dr. Tipton but the booklet sold really well at the Trident Shop.