We are excited to announce that we recently welcomed Larissa McNeil as the coordinator for the African-American Resource Center (AARC) at Rudisill Regional Library and Aaron Pope as the coordinator of the Genealogy Resource Center at Hardesty Regional Library. Learn more about each coordinator and the Resource Center they manage in this post!
McNeil holds a master of science in teaching, learning and leadership in literacy from Oklahoma State University and a bachelor of arts in English language/literature from Savanna State University. Before joining TCCL, McNeil was an eighth-grade lead teacher at Teach for America who worked with parents and community leaders to ensure growth and success in her students. She came to TCCL with experience facilitating diversity, equity and inclusion sessions and teaching African American history. Her pre-existing skills as a teacher, leader and literacy advocate have already translated to the work she does as the AARC coordinator.
The AARC celebrates the Kwanzaa holiday annually through a community event. In a feature for TCCL's December 2021 event guide, McNeil explains how Kwanzaa "was initiated as a way to build empowerment, strengthen ties to one another and to explore pieces of various African identities.” This year, McNeil called for submissions from local artists of all backgrounds to share spoken-word poetry, dance, song and other creative endeavors to celebrate Kwanzaa. These submissions will air as part of the 2021 Kwanzaa Program: Celebrating Representation, Identity and Diversity on Sunday, Dec. 26 from 5-6:30 p.m. on Facebook. Watch the event online at www.facebook.com/tulsalibrary or www.facebook.com/tulsalibraryAARC.
McNeil is pictured below with items gathered for a Kwanzaa display at Rudisill Regional Library.
The purpose of the AARC is to collect, preserve and provide access to resources honoring and documenting the experiences of people of African descent. The center is devoted to providing the community with current and comprehensive resource materials and professional reference materials on the culture and history of African Americans. Learn more about it at www.tulsalibrary.org/AARC.
Pope holds a master in library sciences from the University of Oklahoma where he worked as a library technician at the OU Schusterman Library, and he has a bachelor of arts from The University of Tulsa. He comes to TCCL with experience cataloging the library collection for the Oklahoma Jewish Archive at the Sherwin Miller Museum of Jewish Art in Tulsa. He also worked as the head of access services at the John Vaughan Library on Northeastern Sate University’s Tahlequah campus where he sat on the library leadership team to supervise both staff and students. Add these proficiencies to his 25-plus years of experience in genealogy research and Pope is the perfect fit for the Genealogy Resource Center.
TCCL’s Genealogy Center is one of the largest genealogy collections in Oklahoma. Along with a large collection of resources on Tulsa County and Oklahoma, the center offers a comprehensive collection on many other states, primarily those states that follow the migration pattern of families who came to Oklahoma and the Midwest. Learn more about it at www.tulsalibrary.org/research/genealogy-center.
Other TCCL resource centers include the American Indian Resource Center at Zarrow Regional Library and the Hispanic Resource Center at Martin Regional Library, coordinated by Teresa Runnels and Amairani Perez, respectively.
