The institute is an intensive, professional development program on the U.S. Constitution and Bill of Rights. Participants take part in lectures and discussions on constitutional themes pertinent to the curriculum content, classroom strategies, and performance assessment. An essential component of the institute is teacher preparation and participation in a simulated congressional hearing as a culminating activity. The hearing is a model for student hearings to be held during the school year. Experienced teacher mentors assist participants in discussing the challenges of teaching civic education and preparing for the culminating hearing.

The present age is one of globalization characterized in part by rapid developments in technology and information systems. But information and technology have often been powerful forces for historical change. This institute will place the current information and technological revolutions in world-historical perspective through a set of case studies drawn from different cultures and contexts from antiquity to the present day. In examining the effects of information and technology on political, economic, and social development, the institute will explore several major themes, including writing and print/information technology; science and society; technology and warfare; and empire and the diffusion and consolidation of knowledge. Presented by professors from the University of California, Berkeley's History Department, and organized around the Content Standards for California Public Schools, these case studies will provide a number of useful tools and strategies for teaching information and technology in world history.

The institute is an intensive, professional development program on the U.S. Constitution and Bill of Rights. Participants take part in lectures and discussions on constitutional themes pertinent to the curriculum content, classroom strategies, and performance assessment. An essential component of the institute is teacher preparation and participation in a simulated congressional hearing as a culminating activity. The hearing is a model for student hearings to be held during the school year. Experienced teacher mentors assist participants in discussing the challenges of teaching civic education and preparing for the culminating hearing.

The Gilder Lehrman Summer Seminars are designed to strengthen participants' commitment to high quality history teaching. Public, parochial, independent school teachers, and National Park Service rangers are eligible. These week-long seminars provide intellectual stimulation and a collaborative context for developing practical resources and strategies to take back to the classroom.

This institute is five days long, with follow-ups in the fall and spring semesters. It focuses on improving student learning through reading, writing, and thinking in history-social science. In addition to helping teachers with strategies for history reading and writing, this institute will strengthen and assist teachers with language arts instruction. This institute is also instrumental in deepening teachers' content knowledge as UC Berkeley professors in both world and American history collaborate with teachers in lesson development.

Ahimsa Center's 2009 Summer Institute for K–12 teachers—the third one in a series on Education about Nonviolence—will focus on Mohandas K. Gandhi (1869–1948) and Martin Luther King, Jr. (1929–68), the pioneers of nonviolent action for social transformation. Participants will work with expert faculty and scholars to learn, reflect, and critically assess the significance of Gandhi and King in their own times and their continuing relevance in our times as leaders of nonviolent mass movements, and also as thought-leaders who seem to have anticipated so many of today's critical issues and vexing problems. Themes and topics covered in the institute will provide a solid foundation for curricular innovations that will help students gain critical insights into the relevance of Gandhi, King, and their respective journeys of nonviolence.

During this two-week institute teachers and scholars will reconsider iconic American writer John Steinbeck, author of more than 30 books, winner of the Pulitzer Prize (in 1940, for The Grapes of Wrath), the Nobel Prize for Literature (1962), and the United States Medal of Freedom (1964). Days will be filled with study, exploration of the area, discussion, and reflection. During the two weeks, participants will have ample opportunity to appreciate "Steinbeck Country" through exploration of the land and Steinbeck's literature.

This workshop provides a varied program of lectures, demonstrations, analysis of documents, independent research, and group work that introduces teachers to the holdings and organization of the National Archives. Participants will learn how to do research in historical records, create classroom material from records, and present documents in ways that sharpen students' skills and enthusiasm for history, social studies, and the humanities. Each participant selects and prepares to research a specific topic, searches the topic in the records of the National Archives, and develops a teaching unit that can be presented in his or her own classroom.