Diversity Award: The Center for Radio Preservation and Archives at WYSO

The Center for Radio Preservation and Archives at WYSO, a nonprofit community owned public radio station in Yellow Springs, Ohio, is the 2025 recipient of the Diversity Award given by the Society of American Archivists (SAA). The award recognizes outstanding contributions in advancing diversity within the archives profession, SAA, or the archival record.

WYSO and its Center for Radio Preservation and Archives has pioneered a combination of local and national archives work that advances diversity within the archives field. While there are four projects under the center’s umbrella, its most ambitious and catalyzing work to date is the HBCU Radio Preservation Project (HBCU RPP). This project is dedicated to honoring and preserving the vibrant history and cultural resource that is HBCU radio. Led by Director of the Center for Radio Preservation and Archives and HBCU RPP Director Jocelyn Robinson, the project has three elements: training and education, preservation, and public history praxis.

In partnership with the Northeast Document Conservation Center (NEDCC), the Margaret Walker Center at Jackson State University, and the American Archive of Public Broadcasting, the project has made site visits and provided field preservation services to fifteen HBCUs thus far and reformatted more than 1,000 HBCU radio audio assets. The project is also awarding capacity-building mini grants to HBCUs with radio stations to support their preservation efforts. Further, HBCU RPP is collaborating with the American Archive of Public Broadcasting—a joint project of GBH public media and the Library of Congress—to provide an option to the radio stations they work with to make digitized media accessible.

The center, as noted by one of their nominators, is creating a lasting impact on the historical record, “by prioritizing the documentation and preservation of diverse local histories, including those of communities that might otherwise be overlooked, WYSO ensures that future generations can access the full scope of the stories that have shaped the region.” Users of the collection have stated, “It not only has addressed a glaring omission in our infrastructure in our preservation of material produced by HBCU radio stations but also is modeling the single best public outreach and community building model for film and media research.”

The Diversity Award was established in 2011. Previous recipients include Christopher Haley, Julie Varee, Gregory Hinton, and SAA Fellow Rebecca Hankins.