NEA taking the past into the future

Introducing the new NEA Inclusion and Diversity Coordinator

2014-11-19 11:57 AM | Michelle Romero

The NEA Board is pleased to announce the appointment of Anna Clutterbuck-Cook as NEA's first Inclusion and Diversity Coordinator. Her term will run for a three-year period, beginning November 2014 and ending November 2017.

Anna, a member of NEA since 2007, currently serves as the Reference Librarian at the Massachusetts Historical Society. Born and raised in Michigan, Anna earned her B.A. in Women’s Studies and History from Hope College (Holland, Mich.) before moving to Boston in 2007 to pursue her M.A. (History) and M.L.S. (Archives Management) at Simmons College. In 2013, she and her wife, Hanna Clutterbuck-Cook, co-founded the LGBTQ Issues Roundtable (http://neaqrt.wordpress.com/).

Anna is excited to be serving as Inclusion and Diversity Coordinator for NEA. This new position on the Board is an opportunity to bring my scholarly and political interest in social justice work to bear within my own professional community,” she says. “We come to our work as archivists from a wide variety of backgrounds, have varied careers, face unique personal and professional challenges -- and yet all of us are members of this profession and deserve the institutional and community support of our colleagues within NEA.”

In Anna’s view, one of the responsibilities of an Inclusion and Diversity Coordinator is “to offer hospitality and resources to those who may otherwise feel unwelcome. As much as possible, NEA should remove the burden of making requests for accessibility and inclusion off the shoulders of those who face historical or structural discrimination. Within the organization, I will work to hold leadership accountable to our expressed commitment to diversity and inclusion by raising questions, seeking out resources, and offering immediate and long-term suggestions for change. The process of becoming a welcoming and inclusive organization is continual, and my hope is to establish a durable framework for meeting the needs of NEA’s diverse constituency for years to come.

 NEA's diversity initiative began in 2010 with the adoption of a new member-approved strategic plan. In 2011, the Board formed a Diversity Task Force, co-chaired by Karen Adler Abramson (of the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library) and Michelle Gachette (of Harvard University Archives). In the final report, submitted to the NEA Board in 2013, the Diversity Task Force recommended that NEA establish a sustainable inclusion and diversity program. After the official statement was adopted in early 2014 (http://newenglandarchivists.org/diversity), the search began for an Inclusion and Diversity Coordinator.

 Over the next few months Anna will actively seek out individuals and groups within NEA to listen to their ideas and thoughts on inclusion and diversity in our region. She encourages people to contact her through her email (acook@masshist.org), through Twitter (@feministlib), or through her blog, The Feminist Librarian.

NEA is excited to have Anna on board to help lead NEA toward becoming a more inclusive and diverse organization.

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