NEH Grants Support Models of Excellence in Humanities Education
$3 million awarded to 18 projects to create new humanities resources and develop new courses
The National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) today announced $3 million in grants for 18 projects to create new or revised curricula and instructional and learning materials in the humanities. Projects are intended to serve as national models of excellence in humanities education, drawing upon sound scholarship in the humanities and using scholars and teachers as advisers in the creation of classroom resources.
For example, Long Island University's C.W. Post Campus in Greenvale, N.Y., will develop an online teaching resource in art history, focusing on artworks by Rembrandt van Rijn that are held in U.S. museums. A language project by the University of Southern California in Los Angeles will use interactive technology and sophisticated language games for the study of Italian language and literature. The Associated Colleges of the South in Atlanta, Ga., will develop an online archive of visual materials for teaching French, Spanish, German, Japanese, Russian, Chinese, and Arabic. Several curriculum development projects focus on regional issues, including one by the Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts in North Adams on the lives of five African Americans whose stories link a rural New England county with events and themes of national significance, and another by Pennsylvania's Ridgway Area School District on the role of iron, bituminous coal, and industry in the history of the state and nation.
"With innovative approaches and the latest technology, these scholars and educators will make significant humanities resources available to much larger audiences, both in and out of the classroom," said NEH Chairman Bruce Cole.
Several projects will make significant documents and other primary source materials widely accessible for teaching and learning. For example, the University of New Mexico in Albuquerque will develop a CD-ROM and online resources for students of American history and culture to examine the photographs of American families by John Collier, Jr., whose work was sponsored by the Farm Security Administration during World War II. The University of Texas, Austin, will develop a web-based environment bringing together digital assets of Presidential libraries to create a "Presidential Timeline" of 20th-century administrations, the major events they encountered, and the decision making process brought to bear on these events. Ohio's Ashland University will develop web-based lesson plans and interactive exercises to engage high school students in the study of "American Foreign Policy, 1887-1945: Overseas Expansion and Foreign Wars."
A complete list of the 18 awards is available in the above box.