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Freedom Summer not only marked the mobilization of civil rights organizers in Mississippi during the 1960s, but it also yielded the creation of Freedom Schools and historic legislation. The fight for civil rights continues today, from voting rights to efforts to keep educators from teaching truthfully about our country’s full history. Use these resources next school year to help students contextualize Freedom Summer and how it connects to movements today.

“Democracy is not a state. It is not some high plateau that we struggle to reach so we can finally settle down to rest. Democracy is an act. It is an act that requires participation, organization and dedication to the highest principles.” —Rep. John Lewis

This Fourth of July, commit to the movement for democracy, human rights and justice. Understanding the honest history of the United States means contextualizing this holiday into the complex relationship between the U.S. and its citizens of color. 

Despite the diverse coalition of activists who fought for its passage, the 19th Amendment didn’t bring voting equality to all women. Women’s Equality Day offers an opportunity to correct the record and explore how a whitewashed version of history is sustained and supported to this day. These resources can help you encourage students to think critically about this important anniversary, celebrate steps toward justice and recognize the injustices we still need to fight.

To mark the anniversary, teach a more complex version of this historic milestone and the civil rights movement. LFJ has resources to help. Listen to this podcast episode and watch this webinar—based upon our guide by the same title—to help students delve deeper into the history of Rosa Parks and the Montgomery Bus Boycott. For additional context, students can discuss Browder v. Gayle, an often unheard-of civil rights case that overturned segregated public transportation in the South.

LGBTQ Pride Month starts Saturday, and we're excited to honor it with some of our favorite resources! In this edition of The Moment, you'll find a history of the Stonewall Uprising that you can use to teach the fight for LGBTQ equality alongside other civil rights movements. We're also including our extensive guide for serving LGBTQ students. And we extend a heartfelt reminder that we see you standing up for your students every day—and we appreciate you.

This week, a photograph of a math assignment asking fifth graders to set prices for enslaved people went viral. Assignments like this are clearly harmful. But students can learn about slavery in ways that recover the lives and histories of enslaved people or dehumanize them; celebrate their resistance or erase their agency; recognize how slavery shaped our nation or ignore it completely. Educators can teach this hard history—and teach it well—in any discipline, to students of almost any age. Here are a few examples of how.