Northeastern Illinois University has entered into a five-year partnership with the Chicago History Museum to offer free admission, access to educational services in the Abakanowicz Research Center, and reduced pricing for private group tours and lectures based on staff availability to current Northeastern students and employees.
The collaboration is part of the Chicago History Museum’s University Partner Groups program. Northeastern is one of 10 Chicago area colleges and universities involved in the initiative. Current students and employees can show their University ID at the museum to get free admission, attend programs and receive a 10% member discount at the North & Clark Café, located inside the museum.
“We are excited to now be able to share the Chicago History Museum’s exhibits, programs and Abakanowicz Research Center with Northeastern Illinois University, for both pre-arranged group visits, and individual day-of student and faculty admission,” Chicago History Museum Director of Visitor Services Joshua Anderson said.
Northeastern Professor of Sociology, African and African American Studies and Women’s Gender and Sexuality Studies Olivia Perlow, Ph.D., spearheaded this collaboration.
“I like to take students on experiential learning trips and wanted to bring them to the Chicago History Museum,” Dr. Perlow said. “I’ve taken students previously on free museum days, but I wanted to establish something more solid.”
In browsing the Chicago History Museum website, Dr. Perlow found information about the University Partner Groups program and thought it would be a great fit for not only her class, but for the University as a whole. Dr. Perlow, who’s been teaching at Northeastern for nearly 17 years and is a triple alumna of Howard University, said she wanted to give her students the kind of experiences she had in college. The Moorland-Spingarn Research Center within Howard University is the largest and most comprehensive repository of books, documents and ephemera on the global Black experience. It is home to more than 700 collections.
“The archives at Howard University are amazing,” Dr. Perlow said. “I think it’s important for students here to know that access to archives and history is within their reach.”
The Abakanowicz Research Center includes printed and published materials, archives and manuscripts, prints and photographs, architectural drawings, and assorted ephemera for numerous collections. Among the collections are archives for the Chicago Sun-Times; City of Chicago, Cook County and Illinois counties maps; a collection of local area high school and college yearbooks; and collections for Indigenous Studies, Latine Studies, Disability Studies and LGBTQIA+ Studies.
Many of Dr. Perlow’s students in her Introduction to African and African American Studies (AFAM 200) class are part of Project Success, one of Northeastern’s student support services programs that helps students transition from high school to college. Thanks to the funding from Project Success for lunch and transportation, Dr. Perlow was able to co-organize a trip with Director of Project Success Erica Brown-Pierce to take Project Success students, her AFAM 200 class and Durene Wheeler, Ph.D.’s Introduction to Women's Gender and Sexuality Studies (WGS 101) class to the Chicago History Museum in February.
“A lot of our students are from really under-resourced high schools,” Dr. Perlow said. “They loved going to the museum. They had so much fun and learned so much.”
Her class has an assignment about Black resistance. Part of the project is to consider what history is shown and what’s left out. The Chicago History Museum’s “Facing Freedom in America” exhibit features various perspectives on the Black Freedom Struggle, but also included other groups’ experiences such as information about the American Indian Movement, the U.S. Japanese internment camps during World War II, the United Farm Workers boycotts and the Women’s Suffrage Movement — where Dr. Perlow noted a lack of representation of women of color. Within the exhibit, there is also a space where people can select their favorite resistance word and take a photo of themselves with their chosen word. Dr. Perlow said it was one of her students’ favorite parts of the exhibit.
“My students are mostly 18-19 years old,” Dr. Perlow said. “They had fun posing and enjoyed seeing pictures of themselves on the display.”
They also enjoyed “Designing for Change: Chicago Protest Art of the 1960s-70s.”
“There was a lot on the Black Freedom Struggle in Chicago and beyond,” Dr. Perlow said. “Of course, the exhibit had well-known Chicagoans like Gwendolyn Brooks and Margaret Burroughs, but it also had information on the Chicago Women’s Liberation Union, the Gay Rights Movement, the Anti-War Movement and more.”
Dr. Perlow believes experiences like this help students not only understand history, but to learn more about themselves and how they can shape the future.
“Before my class, many students didn't know about Jean Baptiste Point du Sable or that he’s recognized as the founder of Chicago,” Dr. Perlow said. “They don’t know about ancient African civilizations. It’s about Sankofa: You can’t understand present-day social conditions without understanding your history, so you gotta go back and fetch it.”
