Project Working Papers
Our Project Working Papers will be published here soon!
In the interim, please explore the curated resources available below.
Resources
Selection of Historical Societies with Civic Learning Initiatives by State
This source is a link to the Georgia History Festival website, an educational event created by the Georgia Historical Society. Inspired by the nation’s 250th anniversary, the Festival’s theme this year is A Nation of Laws: Courts and the Foundation of Freedom. The website includes Georgia-specific learning events for the local community, such as a Georgia Day Expo and Historical Art Contest in Savannah, but the website also has online resources for educators centered on the theme.
This website is a Massachusetts-specific guide to 2026’s National History Day. The site includes links to various state-centric potential topics, cultivated by the Historical Society. Each of these links provides resources and key questions for teachers and students.
Virginia’s 250th anniversary website contains a variety of resources that are future-oriented in nature. These include local and virtual exhibits, local activities, and a podcast. Most importantly, the website contains a section about civic education with videos and resources for teachers and students.
This link leads to the Vermont Historical Society’s 250th anniversary website page. This page contains a wide variety of information, with sections about archives and information about local exhibits. The page also includes a link to the Historical Society’s “All in Vermont” initiative, created to encourage students to study Vermont’s history and connect it with the state’s geography, culminating in the creation of a historical map. This subsection contains guides for educators.
Historical Society of Pennsylvania
While most of the Pennsylvania Historical Society’s 250th resources are in-person exhibits, their website has a robust “For Education” section with links to sources for students, information on Philadelphia’s National History Day participation, and lesson plans for educators. These are accessible at this link.
New Hampshire Historical Society
The New Hampshire Historical Society website’s “Educate” section contains important information about the state’s initiatives to improve civics education. One such initiative is called “Moose on the Loose”, an interactive site made by the Historical Society for elementary school children to provide engaging lessons about the state’s history. The website includes a variety of activities and educational resources for students.
Selection of Historical Societies with Civic Learning Initiatives by City
Chicago History Museum’s 250th
The Chicago History Museum’s 250th website is focused on Civic Action. The website links to a variety of exhibitions at the museum itself and several that are online, all of which encourage visitors to contemplate how they see democracy working in Chicago. The site also highlights “Civic Season”, which takes place over the summer at the Museum and encourages visitors to think about their civic participation through interactive exhibits.
This link on the New York Historical Society website allows visitors to read others’ hopes for America’s future, and submit their own, as the nation approaches its 250th year. Here, people can craft, or imagine, their own visions of liberty and share their ideas.
Museum of the American Revolution
Philadelphia’s Museum of the American Revolution allows visitors to explore the history of this foundational period of the nation’s history in a variety of ways. Currently, the Museum is offering an exhibition called “The Declaration’s Journey” to reflect on America’s 250th. This exhibition conceptualizes the Declaration as part of an “ongoing revolution”, and follows the document’s path from its creation to present with documents, art, and artifacts. The Museum’s website also offers timelines, virtual tours and educational resources for teachers and students.
American Philosophical Society
The American Philosophical Society focuses specifically on early American history, among other research areas. For the nation's 250th, the Society has created an exhibit called “These Truths: The Declarations of Independence”. This exhibit focuses on the many functions of the Declaration throughout history, highlighting its initial use as a news source, then a political document, and also a “national symbol”. The website describes the Declaration’s beginnings as “a process, not an event”. The exhibit, which opens in April of this year, consists of several artifacts under the Society’s ownership. The website also provides lesson plans for teachers and other educational materials such as podcasts.
The John Carter Brown Library, located at Brown University, is celebrating the nation’s 250th with an initiative called 2026 and Beyond. The website highlights that the initiative is made up of three subsections. The first is Foundations of Revolution: The Democratic Revolutions of the Early Americas, which will focus on spotlighting wider democratic implications of the Revolution. The second is Foundations of Democracy: Freedom of Religion and Conscience, which will create programming that discusses themes of tolerance. The final section is Foundations of Historical Knowledge: How Libraries Make History, which will center around rethinking who creates history, and how. The variety of resources and events produced by the initiative will be available to those in academia as well as the public.
Other Organizations
Civically Engaged Districts Project
The Civically Engaged Districts project, spearheaded collaboratively by partially by TC’s Professor Beth Rubin of Teachers College, Columbia University, is an initiative that seeks to encourage the civic engagement of youth in their school communities. This work is informed by Youth Participatory Action Research (YPAR), which allows students to identify an issue in their community to study, conduct research, and share their findings. The website contains a section about the Civic Action Research Cycle, which provides educators with materials for implementation of YPAR.
DemocracyReadyNY is an organization that seeks to bring civic education to all New York students. The initiative focuses on six main issues: Assessment of Civic Readiness, Civic Education Equity and Access, Civic Learning in the Early Grades, Media Literacy Education, Navigating Challenging Topics in the Classroom, and Youth Engagement. Each of these issues has a section on the website with relevant educational resources and related organizations. The website offers a variety of other civics and policy-related publications. The organization also participates in the statewide New York Civic Learning Week.
The Smithsonian Institution: Democracy in Dialogue Virtual Exchange Program
The Smithsonian Institution’s Democracy in Dialogue Virtual Exchange program encourages communities in schools and cultural organizations around the country to engage with each other as the nation’s 250th anniversary approaches. Student groups from various locations are paired and meet to discuss the history and culture of their respective hometowns, guided by facilitators, and create a final project where they reflect on these experiences.
National History Day (NHD) is an organization that engages young people in history and civics education by hosting a yearly history contest for students and providing resources and professional development to teachers. This year’s NHD theme is Revolution, Reaction, Reform in History. Students from grades 6-12 create research projects based on the theme and compete with other students internationally.
The Center for Educational Equity at Teachers works to encourage democratic governance in schools through research, resources, and community engagement. The website highlights the Center’s School Board and Youth Engagement (S-BYE) Lab, which gathers data to analyze and improve youth representation on school boards. The Center has a variety of other initiatives, such as the School Spending Innovation Project, which brings the community into school finance management processes that are typically top-down. The website includes many resources related to these initiatives.
Made By Us is an initiative aiming to encourage civic engagement among Gen Z youth by conveying information in more accessible, culturally relevant ways. The organization works with museums and nonprofits to create digestible resources and support students in their civic participation journeys. The website has resources for partner organizations, as well as a variety of educational links and community groups for young people hoping to get involved. It also has a “Youth250” section with toolkits for both organizations and youth. Website visitors can also register for the sixth annual Civic Season (Juneteenth to July 4th, 2026) and find out how their organizations can host a “Wish Wall” as an easy, uplifting way to participate in the U.S. 250th anniversary.
National Museum of American History
The National Museum of American History’s Education section provides resources for educators to help introduce students to key aspects of civic history and engagement. These include lessons about historical events and documents, as well as resources regarding broader topics such as voting. This website provides educators with lesson plans, activities, related media, and primary sources.
Media
PBS: The American Revolution Documentary
This PBS documentary by Ken Burns, Sarah Botstein and David Schmidt provides an overview of the American Revolution in six episodes. The website for the documentary provides more in-depth information about each episode, including timelines, key historical actors, and biographies. It also includes related articles, interactive activities, and links to relevant media.