The College of Education and the College of Arts and Sciences at Georgia State University are helping DeKalb County public school teachers expand their American history knowledge, in an effort to increase student achievement in social studies.
 
DeKalb County Public Schools, with Georgia State as a partner, was awarded a "Teaching American History" grant from the federal government this summer.
 
The grant, roughly $1 million over the next three years, will cover professional development expenses for American history teachers in elementary, middle and high schools. Educators hope to get an extension of the grant for a total of $1.6 million over five years.
 
DeKalb County teachers have an opportunity to take two graduate level courses at Georgia State, one in education and one in history, which is offered by the History Department at Georgia State.
 
Teachers will earn graduate course credit at GSU, continuing education credit with their district and a stipend to help cover their tuition, books and supplies as well as travel to historical sites.
 
Nearly 30 DeKalb teachers will be eligible for the program each year, for a total of 90 over three years. The program is designed to ensure teachers develop the knowledge and skills necessary to teach traditional American history in an exciting and engaging way.
 
"Our hope is that they learn more historical content, particularly in the areas their students have demonstrated weakness, so not only the teachers learn more content, the students do too and perform better on the state history test," said Chara Bohan, associate professor of middle-secondary education in the College of Education.

 

Georgia State faculty who are working on this grant are Dr. Chara Bohan, Dr. Laura Meyers, Dr. Joseph Feinberg and Dr. Caroline Sullivan from the College of Education, and Dr. Michelle Brattain, Dr. H. Robert Baker and Dr. Christine Skwiot from the History Department.
 
To read more about the "Teaching American History" grant, click here. 

December 9, 2009
4:00 p.m. 

Atlanta, GA 30303 

 

 

 

The College of Education will hold its Fall Convocation on December 9, 2009, at 4 p.m. in the Georgia State University Student Center Ballroom.  Convocation will feature guest speaker and COE alumnus Dr. Cameron Seay (M.S. '93, MBA '95, Ph.D. '05). Dr. Seay is an assistant professor of Computer Information Systems in the School of Business at North Carolina Central University, and the College of Education's 2009 Distinguished Alumnus award recipient.
 
For more information, visit http://education.gsu.edu.