In March 2020, COVID-19 changed and disrupted all of our lives, at Duke and around the world. Essential workers remained on site at their jobs, and those who could work remotely did; classes for students from pre-K to professional schools went online; and all planned events were canceled or postponed. All the while we lived with the fear of how this virus would affect ourselves, our loved ones, and the world around us. Nearly 3 years later, we are still collectively living through this historic time and processing the changes that ensued.
As part of our mission to preserve, maintain, document, and make available for research the permanent records of the functions of the Duke University Medical Center and Duke University Health System, the Duke University Medical Center Archives is documenting what it is like to live through a pandemic. We are capturing all of the news alerts, email updates, and Duke COVID-19 websites. But these materials only tell part of the story. In order to tell the full story, we want to capture the stories of students, staff, faculty, and other people who live, work, or study at Duke.
In conjunction with the Duke University Archives, we launched the Your Story Matters! Documenting COVID-19 at Duke project. The stories collected will be permanently preserved and made available for research in our Documenting COVID-19 at Duke Health Collection.
If you are interested in sharing your story--through writing, photographs, film, or other means--please fill out this online form. Signing up below does not obligate you to submit anything, now or in the future. Signing up simply permits Archives staff to reach out to you periodically to let you know about options for submission, and you can opt out of receiving these notices at any time. The submission process includes options for keeping submissions anonymous; in that case, your contact information would be known only to the Archives staff. Additionally, we recognize you may want time to reflect on your experiences and will continue to collect stories on an ongoing basis.
Most importantly, please know that your story matters. We want to hear yours. Please contact us with any questions.