About the NJCU community that initiated and formed the COVID-19 Archive

The work on view here has been created by the NJCU community. On this site, you will find response projects by NJCU students, faculty members, our friends and family as well as our professional networks in the USA and abroad. The COVID-19 Archive Committee launched the response to an historic and destructive pandemic and organized outreach to students, colleagues, and our neighbors in Hudson County. An essential organizer among the original members of the COVID-19 Archive Committee was our kind and knowledgeable librarian at the Frank J. Guarini Library, Sheila D. Kirven. With great sadness our dear friend passed away on January 9, 2021.

Sheila was known throughout the NJCU and the Jersey City community for her kindness and open enthusiasm for our diverse community. She was often the source of new ideas that would bring us together. The Covid-19 Archive is a good example. Sheila was often the go-to person on campus for new initiatives, unequalled support, and abundant inspiration. Sheila was an impressive sleuth, too. She would search archives, databases, and email trails until she found an answer. Then she would figure out how best to proceed, whether the problem was technical, political, or, sometimes, emotional. She was a vital member of the library professional staff and also many campus groups from Black Alumni, Administrator, Faculty, Student and Staff Organization (BAAFSSO) to the Gothic Knight Ally Safe Zone Program and the Library Exhibition Committee, which she inaugurated.

We dedicate this community project to Sheila Kirven to celebrate her memory and her gift for making hard things, such as the long months of stress and isolation this pandemic wrought, into an opportunity to express comity through a shared experience of building. It is in large measure, thanks to Sheila’s dedication and many gifts for creating common ground, that we have accomplished this complicated effort. While Sheila Kirven was among us, she always made our community a better place.

The members of the committee formed in the summer 2020 and increased through the year come from all parts of the campus community. They are listed here.

Robert Albrecht, Media Arts
Mauro Altamura, Art
Cindy Arrigo, Biology
Robert Aslanian, Chemistry
David Blackmore, English
Gloria Boseman, Nursing
Ethan Bumas, English
Basanti Chakraborty, Early Childhood Education
Zhixiong Chen, Mathematics
Andrew Chiang, Computer Science
Nava Cohen, Accounting
Allan DeFina, Literacy Education
Yi Ding, Mathematics
Jacqueline Ellis, Women's Studies
Edvige Giunta, Professor of English
Gary Gordon, IT
Lukas Helikum, Accounting
Max Herman, Sociology and Anthropology
Joel Katz, Media Arts
Ning Liao, Political Science
Jason Martinek, Interim Associate Dean
Chrystal Mateo, Speicher-Rubin Women’s Center for Equity and Diversity
Jennifer Musial, Women's Studies
Virginia Ochoa-Winemiller, Latin American Studies
Ellen Quinn, Art
Venida Rodman, Speicher-Rubin Women’s Center for Equity and Diversity
Monica Sarmiento, Designer
Christopher Shamburg, President, University Senate
Fred Smith, Library Director
William Westerman, Sociology and Anthropology
Timothy White, History
Midori Yoshimoto, Art
Wei Zhang, Psychology