Grant Lupien loves finding the connections between things. It’s what drew him to major in history — connecting the past to what’s happening in the world today.
That’s also why he enjoys his job as a student assistant in Special Collections in Archives (SCA), because he can see the connections between the University’s past and present through the items in the archives.
“Being able to look at videos from 25, 30 years ago and seeing the progress that has been realized since then is really interesting,” he said. “It has impacted my worldview.”
Lupien works with digital collections archivist Doreen Dixon, helping her transcribe digitized videos and logging items into a spreadsheet to make them easier to find. He has logged around 6,000 items so far.
Lupien said his favorite part of his job is the people he gets to work with.
“It’s a great environment in Special Collections and Archives. It’s a really tight-knit group, and everyone has been so welcoming to me,” he said. “And there’s just so much cool stuff down there. Every day I find cool things … there’s just a vast amount of special and unique things in the archives.”
His favorite collection so far is the collection of presidential campaign pins from over the years.
Lupien is set to graduate in May with a degree in history, and he plans to attend law school. A native of Idaho, he has lived all over the country, attending boarding school in Pennsylvania, and currently lives in Florida. He hopes to stay in the Southeast for law school.
He is a part of Clemson’s Moot Court team, which is a simulated appellate legal argument team. Students present arguments as if they are arguing a case before the Supreme Court, something that Lupien hopes to do in his career someday.
“I love being in the courtroom,” he said. “I grew up doing theater, and I think there are a lot connections between theater performance and arguing in court.”