Christine A Hastorf

The ARF Field School aims to meet the critical need for local field school opportunities that provide training and experience required for students to pursue careers in archaeology. Most employment opportunities in archaeology require field experience, but field schools often take place in other countries over a long (6-8 week) period and cost upwards of $4,000, making them inaccessible to many students. Even if students can obtain scholarships to cover the cost, they cannot necessarily take time off work or away from other responsibilities at home. To help more students prepare for careers in archaeology and to expand participation in archaeology by BIPOC students, in particular, the Archaeological Research Facility at UC Berkeley (ARF) is piloting a local, commuter-based field school. This program will take place in the summer of 2022 and will involve pre-excavation training with in-house archaeological equipment, field-based data collection in partnership with California State Parks and community partners, and post-excavation workshops on analysis of excavated legacy materials with ARF affiliated researchers. The work will take place at the ARF and a local archaeological site. Each participant will receive a stipend to cover the cost of their participation in the full eight-week program.