08/15/2018
Lowell Sun
By Amaris Castillo
LOWELL -- The National Endowment for the Humanities has awarded the Tsongas Industrial History Center in Lowell a highly competitive grant to support a series of one-week workshops for educators that enhance and strengthen humanities teaching at the kindergarten through grade 12 levels.
With the $158,367 grant, the center -- a partnership of UMass Lowell's College of Education and Lowell National Historical Park -- will host "Social Movements and Reform in Industrializing America: The Lowell Experience."
A selected group of teachers will gather next summer for workshops about Lowell's textile industry and how it connects with 19th-century reform movements in the U.S.
According to Sheila Kirschbaum, director of the Tsongas Industrial History Center, there will be two separate workshops in June and July. The goal, she said, is for teachers to bring the knowledge they obtain in Lowell back to their classrooms.
"This is the 12th time we've been funded and no other project like it has been funded by NEH," Kirschbaum said Tuesday. "I'm always just as surprised to find out that we've been funded again as I was the first time. We never assume that we're going to be funded. We're always very honored to be selected among all the projects that NEH has to review to do those workshops."
According to the program's syllabus provided by Kirschbaum to The Sun, the program offered as part of the NEH grant will feature readings, scholarly talks, and multiple workshops.
There will be an application process for educators interested in this opportunity. Details on that are forthcoming.
Along with the Tsongas Industrial History Center, the Concord Museum also received a grant from NEH. The museum will use its $169,831 grant for a project called "Living and Writing Deliberately: The Concord Landscapes and Legacy of Henry Thoreau," according to a release.