The Meredith Morgan Eliassen Fellowship in Women Shaping California Communities was established to celebrate the contributions of women in California representing all walks of life and ethnic backgrounds who shape and enrich communities. The Fellowship shall nurture information literacy skills and research aspirations among San Francisco State University undergraduate students as a building-block to advanced study and life-long learning. The goal of the Fellowship is to build a learning community of scholars with mentors who use ethical mechanisms to surface the stories of women in California using critical thinking skills to show how they function in community building.
The Fellowship shall encourage undergraduate student scholars to engage in grassroots research in California supported by a faculty mentor from SF State. The Fellowship shall encourage research projects that explore how women shape communities through public administration, legislation, economics, health care, land and business management, design, journalism and communications, cultural arenas, and education. The Fellowship aspires to surface stories of California women and their tactics for fostering resilient communities.
The focus on women who shape community life at the grassroots level can offer challenges in institutions of higher learning when the women are not always included in historic memory. While pursuing research projects using special CSU library/archival collections (e.g., the 1968/69 San Francisco State College Student Strike Oral History Archive of the BSU, TWLF and Collective Community) is encouraged, the Meredith Morgan Eliassen Fellows may also use resources from the California State Archives and the California State Library (e.g., Sutro Library), tribal, church, and other non-academic academic repositories with the hope that completed projects will eventually contribute to ethical scholarly conversations and behaviors.
Applicants are welcome to study women in their families from any era who exemplify the common woman who contributes to the wellbeing of her community.
Meredith Morgan Eliassen is a special collections librarian and university archivist at San Francisco State University. She earned her B.A. from San Francisco State University and M.S.L.I.S from Simmons University. Meredith teaches information literacy with primary and visual resources. She is interested in local history and culture, women writers and illustrators, folklore, and design. She has done extensive research on women shaping life in San Francisco, California, and recognizes the challenges of documenting the contributions of women in the West.