Our Current Activities
Israel-Palestine Working Group
Legislative Working Group
HPAD’s legislative work consists of periodic action alerts asking members to call the White House or their representatives and senators in Congress on major legislation of policy. We also ask those who make calls to let us know and usually hear from a few members.
We are working to expand our legislative program. The legislative committee aims to create an action network with point people in each state or Congressional district. These point people will coordinate actions. These can consist of mobilizing phone calls to our elected officials as well as organizing in-person meetings with members of Congress and their staffs. The latter is a powerful way to develop influence and we can organize trainings for our members who are interested in such visits.
As we grow our national membership and acquire new tools to put members in touch with government, we expand our impact. If you are interested in joining our working group or have other ideas about this work, please contact our legislative coordinators Rusti Eisenberg and Prasannan Parthasarathi by emailing legislativealerts@historiansforpeace.org
AHA Working Group
Since 2020 H-PAD has partnered with Radical History Review to organize a mini-conference within the American Historical Association’s (AHA) annual meetings. Alongside traditional conference sessions we have worked with our colleagues to pass AHA resolutions, organized rallies, round table discussions on political developments, and more.
If you are interested in contributing to next year’s meeting, please contact Andor Skotnes. We are looking for panelists and academic contributors, but also people to assist with recordings, distribution of fliers, and related tasks. For more information on our mini-conferences check the links below.
Since 2022 Historians for Peace and Democracy has worked with the Zinn Education Project to defend the teaching of honest history. We created the “Historians-on-Call” network to identify when and where historians can assist in meaningful ways.
Some ways we can provide support include:
- Submit expert comments to state legislatures on proposed new or amended social studies standards.
- Meet with local social studies coordinators, high school teachers, and school boards.
- Research local school board elections, draw attention to the issues, and get out the vote.
- Write op-eds and letters to the editor of newspapers, or meet with their editorial boards to explain the impact of legislation or elections that will censor historical education
Historians-on-Call connects professional historians state by state with local struggles. To date, more than 90 historians have signed up from Arizona, California, D.C., Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Massachusetts, Maine, Michigan, Missouri, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Virginia, and other states. We have created a simple website for the group here.
If you are a professional historian, we invite you to join Historians-on-Call. If you are a parent whose child’s education is under threat, or a teacher who works in a school district that could use the expertise of a professional historian, email us here and we will connect you with HOC members nearby.
Archiving the Culture Wars on Education
The culture wars on education are a series of attacks on how history and social studies are taught and written. They attempt to severely restrict or eliminate teaching about race, ethnicity, gender, sexuality, and LGBTQ issues. They are an assault on academic freedom in higher education and on professional autonomy and responsibility in K-12 schools. They undermine public education in the United States on all levels.
Historians for Peace and Democracy has compiled an extensive archive of materials on the past and present of the culture wars and responses to them. We hope it will help teachers and students at all levels educate themselves about the current crisis and find constructive ways to respond to it. The archive provides a variety of resources that will be useful as well for journalists, commentators, politicians, and the general public. Contents will be updated regularly.
Updating the archive is a lot of work so if you’d like to assist us with compiling and annotating relevant articles, please contact Molly Nolan.
Visit archive: The Culture Wars Against Education
Join us to receive email announcements. To browse our archive of ALL announcements, click here