Student Assistant - Weekly Challenger Collection Internship

The Weekly Challenger is a newspaper that documents the history of St. Petersburg’s African American community from 1967 through the present day. The Nelson Poynter Memorial Library’s Special Collections & University Archives (SCUA) is home to The Weekly Challenger’s physical collection of newspapers, photographs, and ephemera, as well as the digital archive on Digital Commons. The purpose of this internship is to enhance the visibility of the physical collection. The main goals of the internship are to process the unprocessed photograph and ephemera in the collection, rehouse materials into archival containers, and create an updated finding aid for the full physical collection on ArchivesSpace.

Anticipated student outcomes and benefits:

• Gain hands-on experience working with archival collections in different formats.
• Learn about standards and best practices for archival description and preservation of cultural heritage materials.
• Learn how to use archival information management software (ArchivesSpace) to create finding aids and record information about collections.
• Become immersed in the day-to-day operations of a university archive.

Preferences:

• Seeking a candidate with high-level attention to detail and time management skills. The internship will be best suited for an upper-level undergraduate student or graduate student interested in humanities and/or cultural heritage work.

The University of South Florida is a top-ranked research university serving approximately 50,000 students from across the globe at campuses in Tampa, St. Petersburg and USF Health. In 2025, U.S. News & World Report recognized USF with its highest overall ranking in university history, as a top 50 public university for the seventh consecutive year and as one of the top 15 best values among all public universities in the nation. U.S. News also ranks the USF Health Morsani College of Medicine in the highest tier, placing it as one of the top 16 medical schools in the nation and inside the top 10 among public universities. USF is a member of the Association of American Universities (AAU), a group that includes only the top 3% of universities in the U.S. With an all-time high of $750 million in research funding in 2025 and as a top 20 public university for producing U.S. patents, USF uses innovation to transform lives and shape a better future. The university generates an annual economic impact of nearly $10 billion for the state of Florida. USF’s Division I athletics teams compete in the American Conference. Learn more at www.usf.edu.