Local history has a profound effect on our communities. It’s up to educators to learn and teach students about the hard history in their own backyards.
David W. Blight is Class of 1954 Professor of American History and director of the Gilder Lehrman Center for the Study of Slavery, Resistance and Abolition at Yale University. He is the author of Frederick Douglass: Prophet of Freedom, forthcoming from Simon and Schuster. Learn more about his work here.
Certain encounters help young students develop values and virtues that open spaces in their minds and hearts so they can see the world and its people in broader terms.