The 2017 National History Day theme is Taking a Stand in History. Below are suggestions of people, organizations, and themes for projects based on Mississippi history. The examples highlighted in orange are highly recommended. On another page, we offer a list of key anniversaries in Mississippi Civil Rights Movement history. These would also make great topics. Note that these are just a few suggestions. We welcome your ideas of additional topics and resources.
Teaching the Movement Symposium at the University of Utah
Legacies of the Civil Rights Movement, a month-long symposium on four Utah college campuses, will conclude October 3-4 at the University of Utah with the theme,Teaching the Movement.
Monday, October 3: Keynote address by Dr. Clayborne Carson, professor of history at Stanford University and director of Stanford’s Martin Luther King Jr. Research and Education Institute.
Tuesday, October 4: a panel discussion moderated by Robert Goldberg, director of the Tanner Humanities Center. The panel will include Clayborne Carson; Jon Else, a documentary filmmaker who served as producer and cinematographer for the PBS series, Eyes on the Prize: America’s Civil Rights Years;Vincent Harding, a Civil Rights Movement veteran, professor of Religion and Social Transformation at Iliff School of Theology, and author of many books including Hope and History; and Judy Richardson, a movement veteran, early staff worker with SNCC, associate producer of Eyes on the Prize, and author of the recently published, Hands on the Freedom Plow: Personal Accounts by Women in SNCC
Young People’s Project in McComb and DC
The Young People’s Project (YPP) is now working with students in McComb, Mississippi. The Young People’s Project’s mission is to ”develop students aged 8-22 from traditionally marginalized populations as learners, teachers, leaders, and organizers through math and media literacy, community-building, and advocacy in order to build a unique network of young people who are better equipped to navigate life’s circumstances, are active in their communities, and advocate for education reform in America.”
The connection between the Young People’s Project and teachers in McComb was made at the SNCC 50th anniversary conference at Shaw University in Raleigh, North Carolina in the spring of 2010. In December of 2010 the project was launched with YPP staff from Jackson, Mississippi making weekly visits to McComb to work with a team of junior and senior high school students after school.
Putting the Movement Back Into Civil Rights Teaching
The Network of Educators on the Americas (NECA), the Poverty and Race Research Action Council (PRRAC) and the Howard University History Department co-sponsored Putting the Movement Back Into Civil Rights Teaching, a free one-day institute that took place on October 30, 1999, at Howard University in Washington, D.C., funded in part by grants from the Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac foundations.
The objective of this institute was to offer educators the opportunity to rethink how they teach the history of the Movement and to explore new strategies and resources to enhance their curriculum. The sponsors sought to create an experience where educators could engage in a dialogue with organizers and scholars of the Civil Rights Movement and develop a deeper understanding of the complex vision that inspired ordinary citizens to become active agents of change. The institute combined with the two follow-up sessions was designed to provide teachers with the tools to teach beyond the trivial pursuit of names and dates, and encourage students to make the connection between civic involvement and social change.
Of the three hundred participants who attended the institute, approximately half of them were K-12 public school teachers. Roughly half of the 150 teacher participants teach in the District, 35% teach in Maryland, 10% teach in Virginia, and the remaining 5% teach in Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, Illinois and New York. Additionally, college professors as well as content specialists and multicultural/equity directors from the District, Maryland and Virginia public school systems also attended the institute.
The program consisted of two keynote speakers, Bob Moses and Howard Zinn, a poetry reading by Sonia Sanchez and eleven workshops. The workshops focused on themes such as ‘Women and the Movement,’ ‘Socratic Seminars: Using Photographs of the Movement,’ the ‘Puerto Rican and Chicano Movements’ and the ‘Labor and Civil Rights Movements.’
Participants’ evaluations were enthusiastic. One teacher wrote, “I now have ideas and desires that I did not before this day…[and] the discipline and commitment to act on them.” Another teacher wrote, “The institute reminded me of the importance of teaching students why and how to become guardians of civil and human rights. It’s not enough for us to teach them their constitutional rights, but to teach them how and why we must challenge those who violate them.” Participants felt that the keynote speakers “…were outstanding – their enthusiasm, diverse knowledge and commitment [were] inspiring.”
Participants expressed that they learned:
- “…the differences between educating, organizing and mobilizing,”
- “…the history of African American women’s activism,”
- “…that contemporary issues affecting Latinos today are relevant to their movements of the 1960’s,”
- “…that art and creativity can inspire social consciousness, and that I must be brave and creative in my teaching,”
- “…how to teach about history and include the average person and his/her power,”
- “…the need for allowing students to participate fully in their own learning.”
NECA and PRRAC have submitted a proposal to the D.C. Humanities Council requesting funds to begin a publication based on the institute. The project is scheduled for completion by the summer of 2001.
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