The Black Panther Oakland Community School Digital Memory Book Project is a multimedia digital humanities project designed to present the most comprehensive history available about the little-known, award-winning elementary-level educational institution that began in 1971 as a community program of the Black Panther Party for Self-Defense (BPP) and closed in 1982. It incorporates the images and first-person narratives of former students, teachers, staff, parents, and community participants of the Oakland Community School (OCS).
(Photo credit: Donald Cunningham. Photos courtesy: Angela D. LeBlanc-Ernest/The OCS Project)
Oral histories, rare photographs, music, and school publications document OCS’s uniqueness and help audiences understand that the comprehensive OCS educational experience extended beyond curricular content. Since 2021, the Humanities Center has partnered with Angela on the BPOCS research cluster.
(Photo credit: Donald Cunningham. Photos courtesy: Angela D. LeBlanc-Ernest/The OCS Project)
