At a time when many individuals and institutions are reexamining their histories to better understand their tangled roots of racism and oppression, "Reckoning: Kalamazoo College Uncovers Its Racial and Colonial Past" tells the story of how American ideas about colonialism and race shaped Kalamazoo College, a progressive liberal arts…

As Americans contend with the question of which statues and markers belong (or don't) on public land, government leaders, civic groups, and citizens must be prepared to engage these conversations and answer a range of related questions. In this article, the authors view arguments over public statues--statues of persons that reside on public…

Social studies teachers have to create an environment where students are empowered to discuss contemporary issues, such as racism and social injustices. This means students are provided activities that allow them to develop historical empathy skills: perspective recognition, contextualization, and using evidence to make informed decisions. In this…

This report, intended primarily for civics reformers considering how best to defend and improve traditional American civics education, surveys a selection of different civics offerings, both the traditional and the radical. Surveyed providers include organizations such as the Jonathan M. Tisch College of Civic Life, We the People, and Hillsdale…

In the late 1930s, the NAACP launched a campaign to equalize Black and white teacher salaries in the de jure segregated schools of the American South. Using newly collected county panel data spanning three decades, this paper first documents heterogeneous within-state impacts of the campaign on teacher salaries. In states that reinforced…

In a time of unprecedented polarization in the United States, particularly concerning immigration, schools are uniquely positioned to help students understand the consequences of drastic policy changes. Beyond formal settings such as social studies classes, extracurricular activities may be important for fostering discussions about sociohistorical…

In a time of unprecedented polarization in the United States, particularly concerning immigration, schools are uniquely positioned to help students understand the consequences of drastic policy changes. Beyond formal settings such as social studies classes, extracurricular activities may be important for fostering discussions about sociohistorical…

In this article, we describe a collaboratively developed information literacy curriculum that was embedded into three core 8th grade subjects: Algebra, American History, and English Language Arts. The curriculum was rooted in the concept of generalist literacy and supported students as they developed their curiosity, skepticism, commitment to…

The article is meant to be a discursive libationary tribute to Audre Lorde's theorizing on Black women's survival. An example of Taliaferro-Baszile's critical race/feminist currere and Pinar's curriculum as complicated conversation, the article brings together Lorde's voice with those of other Black women to analyze my past, present, and future. I…

This study explored the theme of unity in President Joe Biden's Inauguration Speech on the 20th of January from a linguistic perspective. The main research question was: How was the theme of unity conveyed in this particular speech through linguistic choices? The significance of this work lies in the fact that this specific speech has not been…

Settler archives are situated across the U.S. and housed within institutions such as university campuses. They were invented and placed strategically to help attune the world both to ideal representations of knowledge, understanding, and humanity and to their promises of salvation, progress, and development. In this essay, I argue settler archives…

In "The Other American Dilemma," Rubén Donato and Jarrod Hanson examine the experiences of Mexican immigrants, Mexican Americans, and Hispanos/as in their schools and communities between 1912 and 1953. Drawing from the Mexican Archives located in Mexico City and by venturing outside of the Southwest, their examinations of specific…

This study provides preliminary findings of a larger phenomenological study that investigates the educational experiences of 24 individuals who attended, taught, or served as an administrator at a Black segregated school during the Jim Crow Era. Research supports that much can be learned from Jim Crow teachers and their pedagogical practices that…

Currently, the perceived use of critical theoretical frameworks to shape instruction in public K-12 education is undergoing intense scrutiny in popular and political debate. Chief among such frameworks has been Critical Race Theory (CRT), which, at the time of this writing, has been legally banned or restricted in eighteen states -- with similar…

This dissertation contains three chapters, each investigating a question in American economic history. The first chapter is co-authored with Ran Abramitzky, Santiago Perez, and Joseph Price. In this work, we conduct a large-scale digitization of historical college registers, encompassing 2.7 million students at 65 elite US universities. We use…