Stories
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- Eliminating Poverty and Economic Inequality
Georgia residents fight rail spur that would carve up land of Black families
When Mark Smith brought his fiancée, Janet Paige, for a visit to the farm where he was born and raised in Hancock County, Georgia, doubt and apprehension clouded her mind, despite the sunshine that blanketed the rolling green pastures around her. Smith’s parents lived in a farmhouse just outside of Sparta on 600 acres of…
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- Dismantling White Supremacy
Wreath-laying ceremony honors fallen martyrs of the Civil Rights Movement
The event marked the 61st anniversary of Bloody Sunday, the most violent day of the Selma-to-Montgomery march that would shock the nation and catalyze the passage of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, which outlawed racial discrimination in voting.
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- Teaching Hard History
Slavery in the Supreme Court
Episode 11, Season 1 Building on the discussion of “Slavery in the Constitution,” historian Paul Finkelman examines the connections among the Constitution, the Supreme Court, politics and slavery. This episode offers insights into the ideologies and tensions that shaped the United States, led to the Civil War and continue to affect our nation today. Hasan Kwame…
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- Eliminating Poverty and Economic Inequality
Offer for historic property alarms Black residents of Eatonville, Florida
In Eatonville, Florida, residents take their civic motto to heart. Founded in 1887, “the town that freedom built” encompasses about a square mile of central Florida lushness, billing itself as the oldest incorporated African American municipality in the U.S. Its most famous resident, the late author and anthropologist Zora Neale Hurston, described it as a…
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- Strengthening Democracy & Voting Rights
Permission To Learn: Cultivating Lifelong Learning in Students and Educators
Reimagining education to cultivate curiosity, questioning, dialogue and critical thinking can develop students’ lifelong learning disposition and capacity for meaningful participation in a democratic society.
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- Strengthening Democracy & Voting Rights
How We Got Here and How We Move Forward (With Our Heads Held High)
Bold action and transformative interventions are necessary to reimagine and create an education system that ends harm and advances justice and racial equity.
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- Strengthening Democracy & Voting Rights
Out of the Ashes: Building a New American Democracy
The erosion of institutions to safeguard democracy is an invitation to imagine a new democracy resilient enough to resist authoritarianism and inclusive enough to serve all.
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- Strengthening Democracy & Voting Rights
Reimagining Presidents Day
Presidents Day offers an opportunity to consider how U.S. presidents have used power — for good or harm — and what that means for us.
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- Dismantling White Supremacy
Virginia plantation’s story focuses on the formerly enslaved, not the enslavers
Vincent Carter, 72, has lived his entire life in Gum Springs, Virginia. The town is within walking distance of George Washington’s Mount Vernon — an estate where Carter’s ancestors were enslaved — and Woodlawn, another historic plantation-turned-museum built on 2,000 acres taken from the original Mount Vernon property. “My great-great-grandfather on my mother’s side guarded…
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- Dismantling White Supremacy
Black History Month marks 100 years of significant achievements and milestones
The Black historian Carter G. Woodson — who dedicated his career to the study of Black life and history — responded 100 years ago to the fact that the achievements of Black men and women were not part of our nation’s recorded history. He founded Negro History Week, a commemoration of “the Black past.” The…
