Since 2021, over a dozen US states have passed laws restricting how educators can teach about the past. Similar restrictions have been proposed in more than 40 states, and in many local school districts. In effect, the new laws make it risky and difficult for educators to teach about discrimination in America's past.

Teaching with Integrity: Historians Speak

This video features seven historians describing how exploring America's past honestly in the classroom benefits the nation's students, and how the freedom to learn also strengthens our shared democracy. Speakers: Leonard Moore (Univ. of Texas, Austin), Katharina Matro (Walter Johnson High School), Julia Brookins (special projects coordinator, American Historical Association), Kathleen Hilliard (Iowa State Univ. and vice president, AHA Teaching Division), James Grossman (executive director, American Historical Association), Hasan Kwame Jeffries (Ohio State Univ.), and James Sweet (Univ. of Wisconsin-Madison and president, American Historical Association).

Teaching with Integrity: Confronting a Nation's Past

Katharina Matro, a high school social studies teacher who grew up in Germany, explains how consistent and open education about the Holocaust has shaped her own commitment to democracy and her love of country. Matro also serves as a member of the Teaching Division of the American Historical Association's governing council.