Banned Books Week: People's History Under Attack

"Zinn taught me that people make history. I can, too."

----11th-grade student

While students and teachers testify to the positive impact of people's history, the right to learn that history has been under frequent attack for the past few years.

The governor of Indiana, now Purdue University president, Mitch Daniels, tried to have Zinn's work removed from classrooms. Daniels wrote his education lieutenants: "Can someone assure me that is not in use anywhere in Indiana? If it is, how do we get rid of it before more young people are force-fed a totally false version of our history?"

Students in Tucson watched as Rethinking Columbus and other people's history titles were removed from their classrooms.

Even the American Federation of Teachers published an attack on

A People's History and refused to publish a response.

In each case, the Zinn Education Project has been at the forefront of responding to the attacks. We have played a leading role in making these stories public and defending the rights of teachers and students to teach and learn.

We need your support to continue to defend students and teachers in their fight for academic freedom.

For Banned Books Week (Sept. 22-28), please make a donation to the Zinn Education Project so that young people learn from history about the role they can play in making a better world for us all.

Photo by Victor Ruiz

"Under today's circumstances, one contribution

is not enough, so here's another. Thank you

Zinn Education Project for keeping our history

from being smudged out--now more than ever."

----Kipp Dawson, middle school teacher

Upcoming Howard Zinn Read-Ins

Scholars and activists are planning read-ins of Zinn's work, including at the campuses of Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis on Nov. 4 and Purdue University on Nov. 5.

The events will also symbolize the ongoing fight in the United States against the privatization of public education, attacks on teachers and teachers unions, and the need for real democracy in both schools and curriculum. Read more.

� 2013 The Zinn Education Project, a collaboration of Rethinking Schools and Teaching for Change.

	The goal of the Zinn Education Project is to introduce students to a more accurate, complex, and engaging understanding of United States history. www.zinnedproject.org