'We will not let our history be erased:' Civil Rights vets share lessons with educators

Source: USA Today

Updated Sept. 8, 2025, 12:39 p.m. ET


WASHINGTON ‒ As some educators pull back from teaching Black history, college professor Kijua Sanders-McMurtry is taking a different path. This summer, during a conference break, she typed furiously on a syllabus for a course she's teaching this fall on women in the Civil Rights Movement.

“This is the time that students want to learn about the Civil Rights Movement. They want to know these stories," said Sanders-McMurtry, who teaches a first-year seminar at Mount Holyoke College, a women’s liberal arts college in South Hadley, Massachusetts

She was one of nearly two dozen educators and veterans of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) who met in Washington, DC, this summer to talk about ways to teach college students and others about the Civil Rights Movement. The three-day summit hosted by the SNCC Legacy Project aimed to equip educators with tools to teach about the pivotal movement that changed the country.

Organizers said the effort comes at a critical time, as the Trump administration and others push back against the teaching of Black history and adopt restrictions about what can be taught in classrooms and institutions, including museums.

Read more: https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2025/09/08/civil-rights-veterans-educators-teach-movement-history/85908685007/