For nearly three decades, a little-known federal agency has provided millions of dollars in support and funding to Mississippi’s colleges and universities museums, to libraries and to cultural institutions, including the Margaret Walker and COFO Civil Rights Center at Jackson State University.
In 2011, the state’s largest historically Black university’s cultural center and museum, received a $48,000 grant from the Institute of Museum and Libraries Services. The grant paid for staff to travel and learn about the historical preservation work from larger museums and institutions across the country.
“That grant was my professional development,” Robert Luckett, director of the cultural center said. “It was so important and has been foundational for all of the work we’ve done at Jackson State for the last fifteen, sixteen years.”
But, Jackson State isn’t the only Mississippi college that has benefitted from funds from IMLS, and the federal agency has flowed millions of dollars in grants to the state.
In 2022, Mississippi State University received a $74,000 grant to fund its Office of Museum Services and a $50,000 grant from the American Rescue Plan for Museums and Libraries to train and hire students from underserved communities to assist with biological collection and conservation. That same year, Northwest Mississippi Community College received $33,000 from the agency to support a series of community engagement discussions for students around racial injustice, mental health and stress in the post COVID-19 pandemic.
In 2020, Hinds Community College Utica’s campus received a $101,000 grant from IMLS’s Museums Grants for African American History and Culture to establish an oral history project for Black rural Mississippians and provided technology and equipment to record stories for residents who couldn’t make it to the campus museum. The federal agency also awarded $500,000 to the University of Mississippi through its Save America’s Treasures program and in 2010 a $450,000 grant to its Modern Political Archives to preserve and digitize 3,800 audio and visual recordings.
The Margaret Walker Center, which houses oral histories, manuscripts, book collections and history archives of Black Mississippians, and operates as the Black Studies Institute for Jackson State University, has been a cornerstone of cultural development for students.
Now, with an executive order from President Donald Trump, which led the federal agency’s nearly 70 employees to be placed on administrative leave last week, the future of the Margaret Walker Center’s work remains unclear.
The move to shut down IMLS comes weeks after President Donald Trump signed an executive order to scale down six other federal agencies to “the minimum presence,” according to The Washington Post.
The agency’s funding, which is less than one percent of the federal budget, has dolled out millions of dollars to museums, libraries and institutions. But, in states like Mississippi, where access to traditional resources and support for cultural institutions may be near to none or nonexistent, the agency’s funding has been essential in providing tools to do important work, Luckett said.
Out of the eight full-time staff members at the cultural center, two staff and a graduate fellow who works to digitize the historical archives is funded by subgrants of IMLS through the Smithsonian Institute, another national cultural institution facing cuts by the Trump administration. These jobs on the digital humanities staff could be in jeopardy.
Earlier this year, Luckett said his team applied for another grant from IMLS to pay for their renovation project of Ayer Hall, the oldest building on Jackson State University’s campus and home to the Margaret Walker Center. The grant funding will provide support for staff to move its collections into a safe environment.
Luckett said the cultural center was supposed to be notified in June if they receive the grant. But, with the changes to the agency, he’s unsure of what comes next.
“We don’t have the funding to do this,” Luckett said. “We’ll be back to square one.”
Other cultural institutions and organizations across the state such as the Mississippi Humanities Council, which currently has 35 open subgrants to various state colleges and universities, were reeling after hearing a major defunding announcement.
In a late night email, the organization learned their grant through the National Endowment of Humanities had been terminated. The national organization has provided more than 400 grants in Mississippi, including colleges in the state.
Sweeping cuts at IMLS and the National Endowment of Humanities threaten the future of established museum and library programs at local colleges from panels, literary festivals, history tours, youth education workshops and other public programs.
“In [Mississippi] our greatest strength is our history and culture,” Stuart Rockoff, executive director of the Mississippi Humanities Council, said. “Our grants and our programs have helped highlight that especially in smaller towns and rural areas of our state.”
The state’s cultural organization doled out various grants to Mississippi’s public universities and colleges, including a $8,400 grant to the Margaret Walker Center last year, which held a panel discussion on local activism in reflection to Mississippi’s civil rights movement history.
Luckett said protecting the state’s historical collections and providing access to them are key components for the curriculum for students at Jackson State University to engage in scholarship and research.
“These skills are not politicized,” Luckett said. “These are important learning tools for any student of any discipline.”
While it’s easy to ignore the federal agency being closed, the outside impact that such a small agency has on the country is remarkable, Luckett added.
“These are public servants doing these jobs, who are committed and who aren’t willing to get rich,” Luckett said. “This assault on IMLS is something we should all be worried about.”
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