About the project
The University of South Carolina Beaufort (USCB) will host a three-week summer institute for 25 k-12 teachers from July 9-29, 2017 as a workshop for educators to learn more about one of the most neglected and misunderstood periods in our nation’s history, and to demonstrate how that history has been influenced by events and personalities originating from the Sea Islands of South Carolina and Georgia. Three broad themes will be examined closely over the course of the institute, including: (1) the prelude to Reconstruction (2) Reconstruction and its Aftermath and (3) Historical Memory and the “Second Reconstruction,” the modern Civil Rights Movement. Each theme will offer unique coverage of the most significant issues, events, historical actors, and watershed moments during Reconstruction.
This institute will guide the teachers through more than a century of American history—from the final years of the cotton kingdom in the South, through the Civil War and Reconstruction, and up to the modern civil rights era. Key questions will be posed each day and Visual essay projects will provide a photographic and period art component to show how images and visual culture were central to Americans’ understanding of contemporary events. Educators will also explore the exploits, writings, and influences of key Reconstruction figures, as well as the ideologies that motivated them. The institute will devote one week each to a close examination and study of each theme. Place is also important for this institute, therefore each theme has been carefully mapped out around key locations to help the teacher scholars gain a better understanding of the issues and to personalize the story. Alternating between lecture and experience, the institute will unfold on St. Helena Island, Port Royal, Mitchellville (on Hilton Head Island), and Charleston, South Carolina, and Sapelo Island, Georgia. To achieve high-level results, USCB has formed a partnership with the City of Beaufort, the historic Penn Center, The Beaufort Museum, and the University Of South Carolina College Of Education. Partners will combine their internal resources and expertise around four goals that:
- Prepare teachers in grades k-12 to be highly qualified to teach key themes and content about the Reconstruction Era.
- Prepare teachers to use engaging and innovative instructional strategies to motivate students to learn about Reconstruction and other periods of American history.
- Prepare teachers to use the tools of historical investigation to deepen and extend their knowledge of Reconstruction and American history.
- Develop a collaborative exchange of practice between teachers and historians that improve their work and build a repertoire of high-quality examples and resource materials.
America’s Reconstruction: The Untold Story will offer the three- week summer institute at the USCB historic campus in the heart of the Beaufort Historic District. However, sufficient time will also be spent at other sites in South Carolina and Georgia. Learning about the history of Reconstruction through the lenses of time, space, and place will provide teacher scholars with a real sense of the landscape and the physical environment in which this history occurred. To ensure that our model of faculty development transfers beyond the 2017 institute, this intensive experience will be enhanced by web-based follow-up support that is designed to deepen teacher content knowledge and models effective strategies for historical investigation and increased student learning. This online information center will provide universal access and be used to foster a collaborative exchange of practice.
ELIGIBILITY CRITERIA
These projects are designed principally for full-time and part-time classroom teachers and librarians in public, charter, independent, and religiously affiliated schools, as well as home schooling parents. Other K-12 school personnel, including administrators, substitute teachers, and classroom professionals, are also eligible to participate.
Teachers at schools in the United States or its territorial possessions or Americans teaching in foreign schools where at least 50 percent of the students are American nationals are eligible for this program. Applicants must be United States citizens, residents of U.S. jurisdictions, or foreign nationals who have been residing in the United States or its territories for at least the three years immediately preceding the application deadline. Foreign nationals teaching abroad at non-U.S. chartered institutions are not eligible to apply.
Individuals may not apply to an NEH Summer Seminar or Institute whose director is affiliated with the same institution or is a family member. Individuals must not apply to seminars directed by scholars with whom they have previously studied. Institute selection committees are advised that only under the most compelling and exceptional circumstances may an individual participate in an institute with a director or a lead faculty member who has previously guided that individual’s research or in whose previous institute or seminar he or she has participated.
To be considered eligible, applicants must submit a complete application. This includes an NEH cover sheet and the additional materials requested on the individual seminar or institute website.
SELECTION CRITERIA
A selection committee will read and evaluate all properly completed applications in order to select the most promising applicants and to identify a number of alternates. Seminar selection committees typically consist of the seminar director, a school teacher who is usually a participant in a previous NEH summer program, and a colleague of the director. Institute selection committees typically consist of three to five members, usually drawn from the institute faculty and staff members.
Special consideration is given to the likelihood that an applicant will benefit professionally and personally from the seminar/institute experience. It is important, therefore, to address each of the following factors in your application essay:
1. your effectiveness and commitment as a teacher/educator;
2. your intellectual interests, in general and as they relate to the work of the project;
3. your special perspectives, skills, or experiences that would contribute to the seminar or institute;
4. the likelihood that the experience will enhance your teaching.
While recent participants are eligible to apply, selection committees are charged to give first consideration to applicants who have not participated in an NEH-supported seminar, institute, or workshop in the last three years (2014, 2015, 2016). Additionally, preference is given to applicants who would significantly contribute to the diversity of the program.
STIPEND, TENURE, AND CONDITIONS OF AWARD
Teachers selected to participate in four-week projects will receive a stipend of $3,300; those in three-week projects will receive $2,700; those in two-week projects will receive $2,100; and those in one-week projects will receive $1,200. Stipends are intended to help cover travel expenses to and from the project location, books and other research expenses, and ordinary living expenses. Stipends are taxable. Applicants to all projects should note that supplements will not be given in cases where the stipend is insufficient to cover all expenses.
Seminar and institute participants are required to attend all meetings and to engage fully as professionals in the work of the project. During the project's tenure, they may not undertake teaching assignments or any other professional activities unrelated to their participation in the project. Participants who, for any reason, do not complete the full tenure of the project will receive a reduced stipend.
At the end of the project's residential period, NEH Summer Scholars will be asked to submit online evaluations in which they review their work during the summer and assess its value to their personal and professional development. These evaluations will become part of the project's grant file.
For more information click "Further official information" below.
This opportunity has expired. It was originally published here:
http://www.uscb.edu/americasreconstruction/index.html/