Morristown National Historical Park Museum and Library: Educational Activity - Juneteenth

Monday, October 26, 2020

Educational Activity - Juneteenth - We Need to Talk

On June 19, 2020 – the anniversary of Juneteenth, Wendy O’Sullivan, Superintendent of the Chesapeake Bay National Park Service office, convened a Zoom Call involving eight distinguished Black professionals in her organization. Their goal was to discuss the intersection of race, history, and the outdoors. In her opening remarks, Superintendent O’Sullivan indicated that “…in this historic moment for our society…we need to start talking again….To truly start listening again and openly talking about the history of systemic racism and inequities in America is what we need to do now.”

This conversation continues within families, organizations and classrooms throughout America and in other countries as well and can be a difficult one.

This Zoom call has been made available on You Tube and is accessible by clicking below. We are posting this blog to facilitate similar discussions in homes or outside organizations and classrooms.

Click Here

The entire video is about ninety minutes in length and consists of the following:

Part 1 – Start to 00:28 minutes – Introductions, personal backgrounds and areas of expertise

Part 2 – 00:28:22 to 01:14:00 – individual experiences in the lives of these participants, and in the Park Service. How have they been impacted by institutional and systemic racism.

Part 3 – 01:14:00 to 01:31:00 – what are recommendations on the question – “what can we do in our work in the NPS to facilitate more equity?”

While the entire video is “…honest, open, thoughtful and inspiring”, Part 2 is relatable to family and classroom discussion. With the assistance of a number of Social Studies Supervisors we have included time-stamped discussion guides for Grades 4-6 and 7-12 for your use. Within each are links to grade appropriate lesson plans. Feel free to adapt the guides as required.

Grades 4 – 6 – Key Vocabulary Terms