Seizing the moment: A critical place-based partnership for antiracist elementary social studies teacher education

ABSTRACT

We designed and implemented a hybrid elementary social studies education elective focused on antiracist teacher education, place-based teacher education, and archaeology with partners at an historic site, James Madison’s Montpelier. Our action research study indicates that, in the midst of injustices highlighted in 2020, participants engaged in meaningful race reflection in ways that demonstrated shifts toward becoming more antiracist individuals and teachers. Purposeful course work and interactions with course texts and participants, as well as the power of the place itself, supported students’ race reflections toward increased racial awareness and understandings of how to facilitate their future elementary students’ racial literacy. Implications include that critical place-based experiences have the potential to serve as powerful learning experiences to prepare preservice social studies teachers to teach children about race and racism.

KEYWORDS:

• Antiracist education
• elementary teacher education
• place-based learning

Acknowledgments

The authors wish to thank Dr. Matt Reeves, Dr. Terry Brock, Dr. Mary Furlong-Minkoff, and Mr. Chris Pasch for their partnership throughout this program. You have been and continue to be a source of personal and systemic change and inspiration.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1. In June 2021, Montpelier became the first presidential home in the United States to agree to structural parity between its board of directors and a committee representing the descendants of individuals who were enslaved on the site. By Spring 2022, however, The Montpelier Foundation Board (TMF) had already moved to retain control of the site, redefining the role of the Montpelier Descendant Committee (MDC) in identifying board members to represent them. The MDC and Montpelier staff members spoke out in opposition to the TMF reversal. The conflict caught the attention of The Washington Post (Schneider & Brown, 2022), The New York Times (Levenson, 2022), and other nationally syndicated news agencies. The CEO responded by firing or suspending high-ranking staff members who publicly voiced support of the MDC, including all of our partners in the Archaeology Department.