Where can I get oral history training?

In addition to our MA Program, OHMA offers free, online, public training workshops, taught by our alumni and faculty. If you join our mailing list you will hear about these, as well as our regular Thursday evening public event series, which is also a great place to learn more about oral history. You can watch recordings of past events here. 

Our colleagues at the Columbia Center for Oral History Research offer a 2-week Summer Institute every other year - the last one was in 2023.

There are many other excellent oral history workshops and institutes. You can check out upcoming offerings in the Oral History Association’s event listings. We especially recommend the Oral History Summer School (which is not only in the summer) and these recorded workshops from the Oral History Association.

You can also hire an oral historian to provide training for you or your team.

Can you help me find an oral historian?

Yes! We suggest that you start with our Hire Our Alumni directory and/or the Oral History Association’s Find an Oral Historian tool (which also includes many OHMA alums and faculty). If you are considering hiring a freelance oral historian, please start by checking out the OHA’s Statement on Freelance, Independent, and Contract Oral History Labor, which OHMA endorses.

We do also circulate calls for proposals and job descriptions to our alumni mailing list. We require that these include salary/pay information, in accordance with New York State law.

Where do our students go after OHMA

Here is a list of employers who have hired graduates from OHMA within the past five years:

  • 1947 Partition Archive

  • African Look Book

  • Apollo Theater

  • Brafton

  • Brooklyn Historical Society

  • California State University, Monterrey Bay

  • California State University, Fresno

  • Child Mind Institute

  • Christensen Fund

  • Columbia University Center for Oral History Research

  • Columbia University School of Social Work

  • Corner News Media

  • Council of Smaller Enterprise

  • David J. Sencer Center for Disease Control Museum

  • Center for Disease Control Museum

  • Ditmas Park Corner

  • Greenwich Village Society for Historic Preservation

  • Groundswell: Oral History for Social Change

  • Just Place: Organizing Stories

  • Kentucky Oral History Commission

  • Los Angeles County Museum of Art

  • Moving Stories

  • Museum of Modern Art

  • Nantucket Historical Association

  • Oral History Collective

  • Open Society Foundations

  • Rural Organizing Project

  • Stanford Historical Society

  • St. Luke’s Hospital

  • Temple University Institute on Disabilities

  • The Museum On Site

  • The New School for Drama

  • Towards Independent Living and Learning

  • University of California, Berkeley Oral History Center

  • University of California, Riverside

  • University of California, Santa Cruz Regional History Project

  • Whitney Museum

  • Wisconsin Veterans Museum

  • World Vision International

  • West Point Center for Oral History

And here are our ongoing graduate school placements:

  • American University, Public History

  • Columbia University Teachers College, History and Education

  • Columbia University, Journalism School, Communications

  • Michigan State University, African-American Studies

  • Northwestern Law, International Human Rights

  • Rutgers University, American Studies

  • Rutgers University, History

  • San Francisco State University, Playwriting  

  • University of Chicago, Anthropology

  • University of Michigan, American Culture

  • Université de Montréal, Medical School

  • University of Oklahoma, Anthropology

  • University of Southern California, American Studies and Ethnicity

 

How can I work with OHMA students? Can you connect me with an intern?

There are two different ways to work with our students:

Fieldwork Partner: we are seeking organizations or projects with which students can partner to conduct three interviews as part of their fall fieldwork course.

Fieldwork partners will be required to work with the student to create a brief project design, ensuring that their work will both serve the needs of their partner and fulfill their requirements for the course. The main expectation of partners is that they will connect students with narrators so that they can do three interview sessions in October and November 2024. Students and fieldwork partners work together to negotiate any other deliverables, such as indexes or edited excerpts. Here is the syllabus from a past year's class, so that you can see what we are asking of students and partners.

Internship host: OHMA students are able to undertake internships for credit. They may be involved in any phase of the oral history process, from designing a project to conducting interviews, processing an archive, or creating a public presentation using oral histories. Students will be expected to negotiate a work agreement with their sponsoring organization or project in advance, complete a certain number of hours of work (100-200, depending on how many credits they want), and reflect on their experience.

Internships can be for fall 2024, spring 2025, or summer 2025, and can even stretch over more than one semester. Sponsoring organizations or projects will be expected to create a work plan, supervise, train, and mentor the interning student, and evaluate their work. We prefer that internships be paid. Here is our internship guide, which has more information on the program. Internships can also be open to alums and students can do an internship on a non-credit basis - in this case OHMA plays less of a role in supervising the internship.

Any given project or organization may elect to participate in one or both of these programs. We will be collecting a list of potential fieldwork partners and internship sponsors over the summer, which will be shared with interested students in August. Please be aware that there is a chance that you may be willing to host a student but we will not be able to place a student with you. If you are interested in being a fieldwork partner, please fill out this survey by August 2nd. If you are interested in hosting an intern, please fill out this survey by August 2nd.

Either Nyssa Chow [Interim Director at the Oral History Master of Arts Program] or Rebecca McGilveray [Program Manager], will follow up in August with those of you who are interested in working with our students.

What should the personal statement include?

A wide diversity of experiences and perspectives in the graduate student body enhances Columbia’s academic life: Graduate students work closely with the faculty, constitute the classroom context for their peers, and make substantive contributions to the University's pedagogical and research enterprise.
 
We ask that you provide a statement (maximum of 1,000 words) that explains how your personal experiences and history will allow you to contribute to the wealth of perspectives in the entering class of the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences and in the Columbia community at large. 

Read More

Is it possible to attend the program part-time?

Due to the intensive curriculum, we highly recommend that students attend full-time; however, it is possible to attend part-time. Part-time students usually finish the program in 2 to 2.5 years. If a student is planning on attending part-time, s/he must meet with the Program Coordinator to set up a long-term schedule upon acceptance to the program. Please also note that most of the required courses are only offered during the daytime.


 

Read More

Can I apply to a M.A. in another discipline and OHMA at the same time?

Columbia GSAS now permits applicants to be reviewed by a second program if they do not receive an offer of admission from their first choice program, with the following restrictions:

  • All second choices are free-standing Masters of Arts programs.
  • Not all programs permit a second choice.
  • Columbia GSAS cannot guarantee that an application will receive a second review. Review is contingent upon deadline and space availability in the second program.
  • Selection of a second review does not affect the review of your application by the program of your first choice.
  • You must select the additional review option at the time of submission of your application; you CANNOT request this option after the application has been submitted.
  • Applicants must upload a separate Statement of Academic Purpose and submit any extra supporting materials required for the second program.  Transcripts, letters and test scores should only be submitted once. However, if your second program requires a writing sample you are required to upload a second writing sample.
  • Applicants applying for the Spring Term are not eligible.
  • Applicants will be able to view and opt for a second choice (if applicable) after selecting their first choice. Do not submit a second application.
Read More

Have you received my admissions materials?

When you submit your application, you will receive a confirmation which means that your application has been received. There are also two ways to check on your application.

The first is to use the tracking number given to you when you submitted the application online. If this shows you have materials missing that you are sure you've submitted, please contact the GSAS Admissions Office directly, as they receive all materials first before sending them to departments. GSAS Admissions can be reached by calling (212) 854-8903, or emailing gsas-admit@columbia.edu.

Read More