Registration for Our Declaration: “We the People” and the Declaration of Independence online course closes on October 1st!
Gain new insights and develop strategies to strengthen civic and history education in your classroom and school! The Civic Learning Institute offers engaging, interactive online courses for teachers and leaders in K-12 and higher education in which you will:
Deepen your understanding of critical concepts and content in US history and civics in courses designed and led by leading experts.
Enhance your teaching skills by experiencing first hand the powerful approaches to supporting learning that you can then use either in your own classroom to support student learning or in your school or department to support the learning of colleagues.
Engage in discussions with other educators from across the country.
Develop (or revise) either a learning experience for students or a professional learning experience for colleagues that you can use in your own context.
Receive feedback and support from experienced educators who serve as coaches in the courses.
The first course, Our Declaration: “We the People” and the Declaration of Independence, taught by Harvard professor Danielle Allen, will begin October 7.
Each course is aligned with the Roadmap to Educating for American Democracy. Developed by a cross-ideological group of 300 educators, scholars, and practitioners, the Roadmap provides guidance for creating powerful civic and history learning experiences to support students in becoming skilled, motivated, and responsible participants in US constitutional democracy.
Online Course Format
Four weeks long
Involve about 10 hours in all
Include four sessions:
Session 1: Synchronous via Zoom (2 hours)
Session 2 & 3: Asynchronous learning through exploring resources, posting assignments online, and receiving feedback from coaches. (3 hours each, for a total of 6 hours)
Session 4: Synchronous via Zoom (2 hours)
Participants who finish a course receive a certificate of completion from the Harvard Graduate School of Education documenting 10 hours of professional development time.
Sign up to learn more and access registration.
Institute
Course Catalog
Our Declaration: “We the People” and the Declaration of Independence
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“Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness,” and the right of the People to “alter or abolish” their government — the famous words of the Declaration of Independence — lay the foundations of our constitutional democracy. In this course, Danielle Allen draws on her teaching and writing about the Declaration to explore how the document took shape and what guiding principles we can find in it for our own lives today. Following the Educating for American Democracy Roadmap, participants will work together to interpret the Declaration’s arguments for freedom and equality and its religious appeals. Participants will also consider later efforts to bring the United States closer to the ideals of the Declaration and to realize its vision of equality and liberty.
October 7 - November 7 | Register by October 1
Live instruction: October 9 and November 7; 7-9 PM ET (view the full course schedule)
Instructor: Danielle Allen, Harvard University
Securing the “Blessings of Liberty”: The U.S. Constitution
November 13 - December 11, 2024 | Register by November 11
Live instruction: November 13 and December 11; 7-9 PM ET (view the full course schedule)
Instructor: Dimitrios Halikias, Princeton University and the University of Florida
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The United States Constitution has been in use longer than any other written constitution in the world, but when the framers wrote and revised its original text, they worried about whether it would be strong enough to survive the conflicts of their day. Could a country as large as the United States really function as a constitutional democracy? Could the Founders create a government strong enough to hold the union together? Ultimately, they created an enduring framework of checks and balances that enables our pluralistic society to come together, debate issues, and find consensus. In this course, we’ll think about the fundamental principles of the Constitution, and how it continues to structure our civic life today.
Upcoming Courses
Making History and Civic Learning Meaningful: Using the “Roadmap to Educating for American Democracy” to Engage Students in Deeper Civic Learning
February 13 - March 18, 2025 | Register by February 7
Live instruction: February 13 and March 18; 7-9 PM ET (view the full course schedule)
Instructor: Natacha Scott, Director of Educator Engagement, iCivics
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What do you get when you ask 300 educators and academic experts, all across the political spectrum, what “excellence in teaching history and civics” really looks like? You get the Roadmap to Educating for American Democracy, a set of key themes, questions, challenges, and pedagogical principles that guide us on our way to best practices. The Roadmap helps us to think about how to make civic learning and rigorous civic dialogue accessible for all students in the United States, how to cultivate students’ civic identity and sense of responsibility, and how to support students as they learn to act in a responsible and informed manner as citizens. In this course, participants will engage deeply with the Roadmap and will practice following its guidance as they (re)design lesson plans and teaching materials.
A New Birth of Freedom: The Gettysburg Address
February 20 - March 20, 2025 | Register by February 14
Live instruction: February 20 and March 20; 7-9 PM ET (view the full course schedule)
Instructor: Diana Schaub, Professor Emerita of Political Science, Loyola University Maryland
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Abraham Lincoln is often credited with having saved or re-founded the American Union by giving it a “new birth of freedom.” In this course, we will seek to understand Lincoln’s statecraft in conjunction with his literary craft. We will concentrate on Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address, examining it alongside the Declaration of Independence which it famously quotes. We will explore the character of American constitutional democracy, with a focus on the concepts of liberty and equality. We will inquire into the nature of self-government and the threats it faces. Why did we have a civil war? What was the status of slavery in the American constitutional order? Why was secession illegitimate? What does Lincoln suggest is needed to forge a new Union capable of achieving both racial and sectional reconciliation? What guidance can the Gettysburg Address offer to later generations? Is there still a “great task remaining before us”?
Student-led Civics Projects: Using Project-based Learning to Develop Civic Knowledge, Skills, and Dispositions
March 12 - April 9, 2025 | Register by March 6
Live instruction: March 12 and April 9; 7-9 PM ET (view the full course schedule)
Instructor: Kathryn Gabriele, Project Manager, Democratic Knowledge Project, Harvard Graduate School of Education
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Student-led civics projects provide a unique and meaningful opportunity for students to examine themselves and their communities, and to cultivate an understanding of their personal interests, motivations, and decisions as civic participants. In this course, we’ll draw from actual student project examples to support you in planning and carrying out projects with students if you haven't tried one before, or in going deeper with student-led civics projects if you've already facilitated them. You may also choose to apply the project-based learning processes and principles to other areas of your work with students.
Superpower: The U.S. and the Vietnam War
March 19 - April 16, 2025 | Register by March 13
Live instruction: March 19 and April 16; 7-9 PM ET (view the full course schedule)
Instructor: Fredrik Logevall, Laurence D. Belfer Professor of International Affairs, Harvard Kennedy School and Professor of History, Harvard University
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Understanding the history of the Vietnam War is critical to understanding the influence and power of the United States as an international presence in the world today. From civil disobedience and protests, especially on college campuses, to the major and rapidly evolving role of television and media in the civic arena, the history of the Vietnam era holds many lessons and resonances to help us better make sense of the intense debate over how the U.S. defines and pursues its national interests. In this course, we’ll think about how best to support students in learning a full and accurate history of this period, and in thinking critically about the role that America and Americans play in a global context.
A More Complete American Story: The History of Jim Crow
July 10 - August 7, 2025 | Register by July 1
Live instruction: July 10 and August 7; 12-2 PM ET (view the full course schedule)
Instructor: Myisha Eatmon, Assistant Professor of African and African American Studies and of History, Harvard University
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Understanding our historical and political context in a full and accurate way, by engaging with hard histories and multiple perspectives, makes us better-informed civic participants. This course offers participants the opportunity to engage with the historiographical debates surrounding the history of Black lived experiences, race (not just Black and White), and immigration (from South America, Central America, and Asia) as they relate to Jim Crow, civil rights, pluralism, and fights against continued oppression. This course also supports participants in identifying the continuities and discontinuities between the Jim Crow era and our current historical moment.
Digital Competency in the Age of AI
July 8 - August 5, 2025 | Register by July 1
Live instruction: July 8 and August 5; 12-2 PM ET (view the full course schedule)
Instructor: Tina Eliassi-Rad, Professor and Inaugural Joseph E. Aoun Chair, Northeastern University
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AI tools such as ChatGPT are already transforming education and the public sphere. How should we engage with such technology to improve student learning outcomes and our society? As it stands, such AI tools are treated as expert, even though they are not expert in any field and are vulnerable to abuse, falsehoods and adversarial attacks. The lack of effective oversight and accountability for this technology exacerbates these problems. This course provides the basic digital competency on how state-of-the-art AI tools work (no prior knowledge necessary) and how we should prepare students to engage with them.
Difficult Conversations in the Classroom
Summer 2025 TBD
Instructors: Meira Levinson, Juliana W. and William Foss Thompson Professor of Education and Society, Harvard Graduate School of Education
Sara O’Brien, Director of Curriculum and Pedagogy, EdEthics, Harvard Graduate School of Education
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Creating a classroom environment that allows for open, honest, respectful conversations about difficult and potentially sensitive topics can be challenging. And yet providing time and space to teach and model for students how to engage respectfully with one another’s ideas and opinions is more important than ever. Dialogue, including disagreement, is an essential part of a healthy democracy. In this course, we’ll examine a case study that illustrates how teaching a topic like Christopher Columbus’ arrival in the Americas or the connections between the civil rights movement and Black Lives Matter can lead to difficult conversations with students, families, community members, school board members, and other stakeholders. We’ll share and model a variety of pedagogical strategies for facilitating civil discourse and supporting students in developing their capacity for reflective patriotism, a sense of voice and agency, and civic friendship.
FAQ
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There is a $15 per course registration fee.
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Each course is designed to be about 10 hours total. This includes two, two-hour synchronous classes (at the start and end of each course), and about six hours of self-guided work and feedback in between, over the four-week period.
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Course topics include foundational texts such as the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, and the Gettysburg Address; crucial periods of American history including the Vietnam War and the Jim Crow era; and pedagogical topics such as student-led civics projects, addressing difficult topics in social studies classrooms, digital competency, and the EAD Roadmap itself.
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All participants who complete the course will receive a certificate of completion from the Harvard Graduate School of Education, which documents participation hours. We are an accredited professional development provider in Massachusetts; and educators from across the country who have participated in our programs have been able to get their hours approved for credit in their home state.
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Yes! You will have the opportunity to put what you are learning into practice by designing (or revising) learning experiences for your students (if you are a classroom teacher) or your colleagues (if you are school leader/instructional coach) to support them in deepening their understanding of how to teach civics and history with their students.
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No. Whether or not you’ve studied or taught the topic before, all educators can learn something new from each course, which will cover both the core content and how to teach that content effectively in K-12 and higher ed environments.
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Yes! The online course, “We the People: Civic Engagement in Constitutional Democracy” is entirely self-paced. Click here to visit the HarvardEx platform on which the course is offered in order to learn more and register: HarvardX: We the People: Civic Engagement in a Constitutional Democracy.
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Educating for American Democracy is an ambitious, ongoing effort to provide students across our nation with access to high-quality history and civics learning opportunities. cross-ideological group of educators, scholars, and practitioners came together to re-design history and civics education. The resulting Roadmap to Educating for American Democracy synthesizes the work of experts from history, political science, law, and education to provide content guidance and instructional and implementation strategies for educators.