In partnership with the National Council for History Education, the Inland Empire Consortium on International Studies, the California State Universities at Fullerton and San Bernardino, the California State Polytechnic University-Pomona, and the National Archives-Pacific Region, the LEA is providing a professional development program for eighth and eleventh grade American history teachers. Close proximity to the Mexico-U.S. border creates a diverse school community that is enriched and challenged by blending cultures, high poverty levels, and linguistic diversity. With numerous newcomers to America, improving the capacity to teach American history effectively is imperative. Activities include week-long summer colloquia, bi-monthly workshops led by historians, yearly primary source workshops, field trips, classroom observations and collaborations with master teachers, monthly professional development meetings during the school year, and year-round website support. Year 1 addresses Our English Heritage, Ideological Origins of the American Revolution, and U.S. Foreign Policy since WWII. Year 2 focuses on the Constitution, Civil War, and Civil Rights Movement. Year 3 examines the Industrial Revolution, the Rise to World Power, and the Impact of World War II.

Participants in this partnership of two school districts, the Constitutional Rights Foundation, Loyola Marymount University, Pepperdine University, and the Skirball Cultural Center will view the major cultural, political, and legal issues and events tied to California K-8 history standards. Located in a densely populated multiethnic community in Los Angeles County's South Bay, Wiseburn seeks to build appreciation for America's story among a student population of first and second-generation immigrants. The program involves teacher collaborations, seminars, workshops, coaching, needs assessments, and learning sessions with historian-coach teams. The professional development program includes such themes as Change and Continuity of American Democracy, Interactions of Peoples, Cultures and Ideas, Economic Opportunity and Exercise of Freedoms, and the Expanding Role of America in the World. Chronological periods cover Beginnings to 1607 and Immigration and Reforms, 1878-1914.

Eighth and eleventh grade teachers of American history will deepen their knowledge of U.S. history and improve history instructional skills through a professional development program partnering the school district with San Francisco State University and the National Archives and Records Administration. The program provides for enrollment in U.S. History graduate courses or enrollment in a 10-session seminar series, document research in a seminar, guest lectures, and dissemination of a document-based curriculum on the project's website. Important historical themes for the project include the expansion of the voting franchise over the last 200 years, as well as the conflict between state and federal authority. The integration of immigrants into the social and political fabric of American culture will be another theme on which the program will focus.

In collaboration with the History Project, a K-16 consortium including History Departments of the University of California at Davis, California State University/ Sacramento, and the San Juan School District, this project is providing teachers in Grades 5, 8, and 11 with a rigorous professional development program designed to increase student achievement in U.S. history and promote responsible citizenship. The partnership's primary goal is to create a state-of-the-art U.S. history program sustainable beyond the grant. Secondly, it seeks to refine the model for adoption by other districts in the Sacramento Valley and throughout California. Content themes include Freedom Visions, Americans We Should Know, and Constitutional Frameworks. Citizenship responsibilities and challenges are underlying themes. Four-week summer coursework is followed with school-year lectures, development of model lesson plans, historical research, and presentation of lessons to other district history teachers.

To raise student achievement and enhance teaching skills in American history throughout a six-county region of central California, the LEA is partnering with the California State University- Fresno History Department, the San Joaquin Valley History/Social Science Project, and the American Institute for History Education. The professional development program for social studies and American history teachers will be available to 200 teachers in Grades 5 through 12. Components include a master's cohort, four 2-day colloquia, seven monthly seminars, and annual six-day travel study tours. The theme for Year 1 is Foundations of the American Nation. Year 2 focuses on Documents of the Nation. Year 3 explores American Foundations and Documents in Action.

Partners in this professional development program for American History teachers in Grades 5, 8, and 11 include 10 rural and suburban school districts, California State University-Sacramento, and Placer County museums and archives. Training is carried out through summer institutes, content colloquia during the academic year, and lesson study teams designed to build effective instructional skills as well as amplify student achievement in and teachers' appreciation for American history. The Summer Institutes of Core Content Learning will be devoted to deepening teachers' knowledge and understanding of major historical problems in American history. Each year, the institutes will focus on improving content knowledge appropriate for the given grade level. The State standards require fifth grade teachers to cover pre-Columbian America to the Early Republic. The eighth grade standards cover the long 19th century, from the Constitution to the First World War, and the eleventh grade standards focus on the 20th century. Fundamental events, key individuals, and issues in U.S. history to be studied are the following: Major Themes of American Freedom, American Biography, and Empire of Laws.

This professional development consortium to enhance content knowledge and teaching of traditional American history partners two mid-size school districts northeast of San Francisco, two collaboratives of small rural schools represented by their County Offices of Education, Sonoma State University, and Marin American Indian Museum. Participants include 60 fifth grade history teachers who enroll for the entire three-year program, which includes orientation days, annual two-week summer institutes, follow-up institute days, an interactive website, and extensive trips to historic sites. The curriculum focuses on colonial history from pre-Columbian cultures through the American Revolution, emphasizing events, people, significant issues, and turning points. Year 1's theme is American Frontiers; Year 2, Colonial Communities and Institutions; and Year 3, Creation of the American Republic.

A consortium of nine northeastern counties fragmented into 128 school districts will partner with the North State History-Social Science Project, the California Council for History Education, and the California State University, Chico. The project will address the lack of preparation in American history on the part of most history teachers and low performance of students on state standards tests. It also aims to establish a permanent structure to support professional development in American history through the California Council for History Education. Summer institutes for teachers in Grades 5, 8, and 11 will be followed by school year sessions, mentoring, conferences, and use of tested model lessons. The content follows traditional American history, covering issues and turning points, influential Americans, and freedom and democracy. Content includes slavery, the American Revolution, and the Constitution in the fifth grade, State vs. Federal authority and Reconstruction in the eighth grade, and the Depression through post-World War II in the eleventh grade.

No Citizen Left Behind targets middle and secondary school teachers of students in largely under-served settings, including juvenile hall, court and community schools, and continuing high school education centers. The professional development program is a collaboration of the Los Angeles County Office of Education, the National Center for History in the Schools at the University of California-Los Angeles, the National Constitution Center, the National Center for the Preservation of Democracy, and the Center for Civic Education and Constitutional Rights Foundation. The program will provide participants with in-depth content knowledge and help them develop instructional strategies and curricula adapted to the student populations. Activities include scholar-led field studies and local symposia, mentoring, coaching, and the posting of educators' best practices to the grant website. Content focuses on traditional American history, covering the American Revolution, the Bill of Rights, Westward Expansion, and changes to Constitutional law. Special attention will be paid to preparation for responsible citizenship in a civil society, and the evolution of social, economic, and political conditions in America today.

Participants in this project are immersed in substantive history content through lectures; small group discussions; independent study and research projects; historical reading and research; field trips to historic sites, museums, and libraries; and historical writing opportunities. Partners share responsibility for workshops and colloquia. Each year a 5-day summer colloquium will be led by the National Council for History Education; a 2-day American history institute by the Colonial Williamsburg Educational Foundation; quarterly American history seminars by the Azusa Pacific University History Department and Graduate Library; 3 workshops per year by the Historical Society of Southern California to introduce teachers to local primary sources; 2 workshops annually by the National Archives and Records Administration to teach participants how to find primary documents; and 1 workshop per year by the Autry National Center Museum of the American West to introduce teachers to their research facilities. Content for year 1 will be the evolution of American political democracy from colonial days to the present; year 2, distinctively American tensions between liberty and equality, liberty and order, region and nation, individualism and the common welfare, and cultural diversity and civic unity; year 3, the changing role of the United States in the outside world, relations between domestic affairs and foreign policy, and American interactions with other nations and regions.