About the Center for Community Research

Mission Statement

The Center for Community Research (CCR), part of Cuyahoga Community College (Tri-C®), aims to understand how communities are formed, maintained and interact with one another. The program was developed to provide resources, educational materials and project-based learning to residents of Northeast Ohio. The CCR manages the Anthropology Collections for Teaching (ACT), a large teaching collection of artifacts, maps, reports, reference books, ethnographies and other historical materials from Northeast Ohio.

History

The CCR started in 1994 as a historical archaeology project to excavate the Metro Campus property as new buildings were being constructed. Mark Lewine and Al Lee built the CCR to include anthropology, history, sociology and urban studies courses utilizing the research and artifacts recovered during fieldwork. The Cleveland Metropolitan School District was frequently part of fieldwork, incorporating students during excavations and surveys.

Other faculty with previous project experience with the CCR include David Bernatowicz and Elizabeth Hoag. Hoag led excavations at the Western Campus, Maple-Linden (the current Metro Campus track) and Shaker Heights Historical Society from 2008-2011, ultimately presenting this research to the Ohio Archaeological Council.

The materials, notes and other associated records from these projects were split between the archives building at the Metro Campus and the former greenhouse at the Western Campus. In 2019, the materials were moved as preparations for renovations of the greenhouse began. Some records, associations and proveniences of artifacts were lost during this time. However, Emily Weglian, Ph.D., salvaged some collections and moved them to a new storage facility on the Western Campus. Part of the ongoing work of the CCR is updating and digitizing the records of previous projects.