At the Guajardo home there is a large display of family photographs arranged on a shelf in the family room which also happens to be the place where they make iMovies using digital camcorders. Francisco said the technology training provided by MIRA was a revelation and changed the way they worked. I looked at the photographs of the family gatherings and wondered if the constantly changing video formats promoted by Apple and Microsoft, Adobe, and Sony would allow for displays of the videos being produced by Llano Grande. Access to a snapshot or group portrait on 8 by 10 photo paper only demands your attention. Using the videos requires software, electricity, and a working computer. If the videos of 2001 are not converted on a regular basis, there will be no audiences for them in 2010. I think about the reel to reel black and white video tapes I have sitting in my garage. One was produced by high school kids in 1975, and it is possible to watch it, but it is terribly inconvenient. For the digital archives of the present to have relevance they will have to remain accessible and convenient.

The family photographs are, of course, about having local roots with links across the river into Mexico. When people come in contact with the team at Llano Grande they want to take part or at least to help. The Guajardos have been in contact with Dr. Henry Trueba, an anthropologist from University of Texas Austin. His career has taken him from one academic town to another, yet he chose to buy a house in Hidalgo County, near the high school. The idea is to start a think tank related to local identity, pedagogy, and history..

In several states my path intersected with other Kellogg consultants visiting the projects, looking for web content, and doing evaluations. The first morning several of us went to breakfast with two young women who had been active in Llano Grande. Later that morning we went on a video shoot that Francisco has set up to give us a flavor of what they were doing with video interviews and for us to understand the lives and backgrounds of some of his students. Some of these students were still Mexican citizens and had been waiting for a more permanent status here for years. All the students were doing well in school, but for them to continue at almost any school meant they had to find substantial scholarship money.