Tackling Hard History with Eighth Graders

We’re publishing this podcast on the final day of Black History Month. The 2025 theme was "African Americans and Labor," focusing on the significant role Black people have played in the workforce – of their own accord or at the mercy and for the benefit of others. The economic aspect of Black history also inspired a Fund for Teachers experience of today’s guest and now informs the perspectives and research projects of Chicago seventh graders. Today we’re learning from Fund for Teachers Fellow Sandra Burgess. After conducting training sessions in Corporate America, then teaching at the collegiate level for 15 years, Sandra took a chance and a job teaching middle schoolers—whom she claims have a lot in common with first-year college students. Sandra is actually a two-time Fellow: first partnering with a colleague at Morgan Park Academy in 2022 to gather materials, impressions and insights pertaining to the Holocaust across eight European countries to facilitate a student-led podcast series. Then last summer, with the same colleague but this time a Fund for Teachers’ Innovation Circle grant, Sandra researched the growth of the slave trade through civil rights resistance in Alabama, Louisiana, Mississippi, Tennessee and Washington DC. Her learning, access to primary resources on the road, and artifacts gathered, catalyzed a research project requiring students to focus on mapping how slavery contributed to the economy of the US, which caused those who benefited to oppose its demise.Sandra says both fellowships are rooted in hard history, elevate narratives of those involved, and changed her life…

Show Notes:

City Project 8th Grade Organization Outline.pdf

Primary and Secondary SourcesCity Project 8th Grade.pdf

MS The Economic Impact of Slavery on New Orleans Montgomery and Washington DC.pdf

Sample Works Cited City Project.pdf

Final In Class EssayCity Project 8th Grade.pdf

Learn more about Fund for Teachers on our Facebook, Instagram and LinkedIn pages and apply for YOUR self-designed fellowship at fundforteachers.org.Music on podcast: Scott Harris: Clear Progress