Without a communal memory, schools have often acted like Alzheimer's patients, unable to remember what they were doing, unable sometimes to recognize old friends, unable to integrate the various parts of their personalities into a unified whole. Too many of our communities have been similarly afflicted. Unlike galleries and museums of brick and mortar, every school and community can afford one. Work that was done last year can be built upon this year. New work can be found by seeing holes in what is present.
Every student can leave a permanent mark upon the place where so much of life is passed.
New people can locate themselves within an established body of local knowledge and lore. As the archives grows, it becomes more and more useful and attracts more and more workers. Through the creation of digital archives, students in the Heritage Project are finding their identity as stewards of local culture-the geography, history, art, science, and lore that no one will save if not them. Technology has increased the resolution of the past and in doing so it has presented us with unlimited opportunities. The past is the future, more exotic and inexhaustible than any country of the present.