Newport News, near the Chesapeake Bay in southeastern Virginia, is a high-need district with achievement gaps across all school levels and between student subgroups. Voices of a Nation will focus on vertical aspects of teaching U.S. history with the aim of creating a more cohesive program. Cohort members will commit to participating in activities, most of which will also be open to other teachers who have a U.S. history teaching assignment. Activities will include lectures, seminars, and Professional Learning Team (PLT) meetings during the school year, supplemented by summer graduate courses and technology institutes. Annual cohorts will have 40 teachers in Grades 4 to 12. Each cohort will become a Professional Learning Community and will break into four vertical PLTs of teachers from schools that feed into each other. The theme of Voices of a Nation is embedded in its name. Although all topics and eras will be covered each year, activities will vary and involve different partners. PLTs will meet several times to chat with professional historians, share teaching ideas, review primary sources, create collections of resources, discuss differentiating instruction, or conduct other activities; all activities will be documented online. Each PLT will complete three products: a curriculum map of one U.S. history strand from the state standards, a digital resource such as a SMART board lesson or virtual field trip, and one product to be determined by the team.

The Navasota, Bryan, and College Station Independent School Districts in Brazos Valley, Texas, serve a growing number of English Language Learners. Overall, student scores on state reading and math assessments are below the state average, surveyed students' interest in history is low, and most history teachers do not hold a history certification. The Mystery and Power of History will offer intensive professional development throughout each year of the program, beginning with a 3-day colloquium and continuing with lectures, workshops, guided readings, 1 to 3-day seminars, opportunities for teachers to attend weeklong historical immersion experiences in the field and/or 5-day summer institutes sponsored by the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History, and several evening platform discussions led by scholars. Participants can also receive support for obtaining a history certification. The Mystery and Power of History will accommodate 40 teachers, each of whom will commit to participating for one or more years and completing at least 75 percent of the professional development activities offered. The thematic goal of the project is to deepen teachers' and students' understanding of how the principles of liberty and democratic government have helped to shape America's social, political and legal institutions. Instructional strategies derived from Historical Habits of Mind will enhance students' higher order thinking skills and their knowledge of American history. In addition, teachers will use technology to enhance history education. The program will develop a group of master teachers and mentors who can facilitate professional development and sustain a Professional Learning Community among teachers of history in all three districts.

McAllen Independent School District in southern Texas serves mostly Hispanic students, a fourth of whom are classified as English Language Learners. Five of the district's 34 schools have not achieved Adequate Yearly Progress: the average Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills (TAKS) score for these five schools is 55 percent, compared to the state average of 72 percent. Most history teachers in the district have minimal credentials in the subject area and few opportunities for professional development. McAllen ISD Project TEACH (Teachers Engaged in American Culture and History) will target low-performing schools and engage 50 teachers annually in four 2-day colloquia, eight 3-hour seminars, and a 4-day summer institute. At least half of the teachers will participate in a 5-day historical site visit each year. The project will also provide support and tuition for five participants interested in pursuing a master's degree in American history. Themes explored in Project TEACH will include complex political, economic, and social dynamics that have shaped America from colonial times through the present. Through training, observation, and feedback, teachers will implement an instructional strategy called document-based questioning. Participating teachers will also share their work with colleagues face-to-face and online, mentor other history teachers, and use Texas's Web-based curriculum management tool to align classroom instruction to district curriculum. The teachers will create thematic "toolbox libraries" for classroom use.

Teaching American History: Tennessee's First Frontiers being implemented by a consortium of school districts (Carter, Hawkins, Sullivan, and Washington Counties and Elizabethton City Schools) in northeastern Tennessee. It targets low-performing middle and high schools and those with high numbers of students performing below the proficient level on Tennessee achievement tests for American history. Professional development activities will include (1) intensive individual recruitment, counseling, and mentoring by a coach, who will assist teachers in developing their own professional development plans; (2) two 2-day in-service mini-institutes per year, emphasizing history content; (3) eight 2- to 3-hour after-school pedagogy workshops each year; and (4) a 3-day summer public history field experience and three 1-day Saturday sessions that relate local historic sites to major themes in U.S. history. Teachers' professional development plans may include activities such as book studies, development of curriculum and/or document-based assessments, examination of student work, and use of data to inform instruction. The project will serve at least 15 eighth grade and 15 high school teachers per year, and a total of 57 teachers will each participate for at least 90 hours over the life of the grant. Traditional American history content will be viewed through the prism of the changing definition of liberty and freedom. Teachers will be trained to make individual and collective struggles for freedom "come alive" by analyzing primary source documents, placing them in a historical context, and integrating technologies into their teaching practice. A program Web site will feature standards-based materials developed by participating teachers and by local historians and graduate students.

The Path Through History (Path) districts occupy nearly 18,000 square miles in predominantly rural central Oregon, a region where many schools are isolated from cultural and historical resources and lack access to many professional development opportunities. Path will provide teachers in these districts with face-to-face and online professional development activities—workshops, lectures, field trips, Web courses and more—designed to bring historical resources to even the most remote locations. In some cases, teachers will travel to meeting sites; in others, project staff and teacher-leaders will make school visits for classroom observations and one-on-one coaching sessions. Each year, 30 teachers—preferably in school or grade-level teams—will be recruited from schools with the greatest needs. Five additional teachers who participated in a previous Teaching American History grant will be recruited to act as district teacher-leaders who can develop all teachers' skills and work with administrators to implement structural changes. Pat will apply five historical inquiry themes developed in the previous grant—the American Dream, the Growth of Democracy, Cultural Conflict, Expansion of Borders, and Technology and Change. Each year's content will align with the grade level(s) of the year's participants. Instructional approaches will include constructivist theory, standards-based teaching and learning, formative assessment, differentiated instruction, use of primary and online resources, and employing critical thinking skills. In addition to skilled teachers who can support their colleagues, the project will produce a research study on the project's effects on teacher and student knowledge, a Web site that includes constructivist, rigorous, and standards-based lesson plans, and ongoing Professional Learning Communities.

Teaching American History in North Carolina was designed to align with corrective action plans in the Pender, New Brunswick, and New Hanover School Districts in southeastern North Carolina. The project will target the districts' lowest-performing schools and recruit teachers who have the fewest credentials in history. Five modes of professional development will be offered each year: a lecture series to kick off each year, an intensive series of content seminars hosted at local and regional historical sites and museums, week-long summer institutes that emphasize traditional themes in American history, history-specific pedagogy workshops that convey strategies for scaffolding reading and face-to-face and online participation in professional learning communities. Each year, up to 25 teachers of history in Grades 4-12 will join the project. Incentives will include a stipend that increases when teachers commit to multiple years of participation. Teaching American History in North Carolina will help these teachers tap into the rich history of the state, especially its Cape Fear region, so that they can help students make sense of history by understanding its local manifestations. Master teachers will support the implementation of content literacy strategies as teachers engage students in the process of historical inquiry. The program will result in increased capacity among regional historical institutions to cooperate with local teachers. In addition, curricula, lessons plans, content packets, lecture videos, and other visual media will be made available on a project Web site housed at the History Teaching Alliance at Cape Fear Community College.

Telling America's Story will target 24 Title I schools in need of improvement within Community School Districts 8, 11, and 12 in the Bronx, where student performance has been extremely poor on New York's standardized history assessments and more than a fourth of all teachers are teaching without valid certification or outside of their subject certifications. Participating teachers from these schools will engage in the following professional development activities each year: eight full-day Saturday workshops featuring content lectures and pedagogy sessions at various museums and historic sites, four workshops on American film, four lectures by professional historians, two monthly school-based study group/peer coaching meetings, and a culminating 4-day summer institute on creating curriculum. Teachers will also receive free passes to 30 local museums and laptops for networking and curriculum development. A new cohort of 25 teachers will participate each year. Those teachers who "graduate" will then become teacher-historians who facilitate on-site project activities within their schools. The thematic focus will be on how historical events and times have shaped America's current and past social, political, and economic values, especially as viewed through the lens of New York City. Teachers will learn to stimulate historical thinking and analysis as they integrate traditional media (film, television, radio, and literature) and interactive literacy techniques such as blogs into the delivery of American history content, making history accessible to all, including poor readers and nonreaders within their classrooms. Classroom-ready media, presentations, and lessons created during Telling America's Story will be disseminated via a program Web site.

This northern New Jersey consortium has more than 157 schools in need of improvement. More than 28 percent of students are classified as disabled and many teachers are not highly qualified to teach American history. Coaching staff—historians and educators—will deliver 111 hours of training, plus eight hours aimed at helping nonparticipants implement curriculum created by participants. The project will offer three distinct 2-year programs, each designed to serve specific grade levels. Each year, each district will have five 2-hour afterschool workshops, one full-day training, a 35-hour summer institute, a regional event/conference to promote replication, on-site and online mentoring, and access to a Web site containing resources and other project products. Years 1 and 2 will involve 60 high school teachers; Years 2 and 3 will train 60 middle school teachers; and Years 4 and 5 will train 50 elementary teachers. The project theme is meeting the 21st Century challenge of helping the increasing numbers of immigrant, English as a Second Language, and disabled students reach proficiency in American history. The goal is systemic reform in a region where many districts have not updated their American history curricula for a decade. Teachers will practice such instructional strategies as historical inquiry skills, differentiated instruction, Understanding by Design, and literacy strategies that address the needs of struggling students. With an eye to replicating the project, leaders have a quasi-experimental design for pilot testing, evaluating and implementing 21st Century Teaching American History. They expect to end with a curriculum that organizes historical facts into big ideas, essential questions, and enduring understandings.

Led by the Miller R-II School District, a consortium of 14 rural Missouri school districts in need of improvement will address teachers' underpreparation in history education by implementing the Preserving America's Midwestern Heritage Fellowship. The fellowship program will offer 40 to 70 teachers of history in Grades 3-12 two professional development tracks. Those who choose Track 1 will attend at least six 3-hour content seminars that include content and instructional skills training in inquiry; they may also opt to attend a 5-day summer travel institute. Those in Track 2 will attend a 2-day fall colloquium, a 2-day spring colloquium, four and a half days of research and review, and a 5-day summer travel institute. Teachers in both tracks will attend Talking History Webinars, prepare standards-based units, lessons, and/or other lesson materials, and receive classroom coaching that employs the thereNow IRIS telepresence coaching system. Five participants will become lead teachers and provide turnkey trainings for history teachers across the consortium. Each year, fellows will research and study the political, economic, legal, social and ideological contrasts found throughout American history. They will learn to use the Binary Paideia paradigm, the American Institute for History Education Signature Strategies, and the CICERO "digital toolbox" of resources to implement grade-appropriate, inquiry-based teaching in their classrooms. Fellows will create historical narratives and interactive lessons that will be shared on the fellowship Web site. In addition, they will create "traveling trunks" that will be available for check-out to teachers across the consortium.

The South Central Service Cooperative is a consortium of districts in mostly rural south central Minnesota, where 73 percent of the schools have not achieved Adequate Yearly Progress at the district or building level. Each year of the Minnesota River Valley program will include a kick-off celebration, seven Professional Learning Community meetings throughout the academic year to discuss a historical work that corresponds with that year's National History Day theme, three topical school-year seminars that emphasize Minnesota connections within the national narrative, and an 8- to 10-day summer institute that concludes with a travel immersion experience. Participating teachers will also receive school and classroom support for involving their students in History Day, a program that requires students to select, research, analyze and present on a historical topic using primary and secondary sources. Additionally, each year, 10 teachers will attend a Summer Teaching Institute for Advanced Placement U.S. History. The Minnesota River Valley program will engage a new cohort of 35 teachers annually. A supplemental emphasis on southern Minnesota history will be embedded in each year's theme. To help teachers address the learning needs of the district's English language learners and children with special needs, professional development will incorporate differentiated instruction and evidence-based practices for teaching history. Enduring benefits will include a Professional Learning Community among teachers working in small, rural schools and increased participation in National History Day.