Educators and the Institute for Common Power
Educators represent our ability to disseminate truth and shape next generation leaders. The Institute for Common Power is committed to supporting educators through conversations, learning tours, grants, lectures, trainings, and more.
We are dedicated to creating a nation of educators who understand and teach honest history while serving as models for students to work collaboratively in building a just and inclusive American democracy.
Truth and Purpose Learning Experience for Educators
Our next Institute for Common Power Learning Tour will be in September 11-16, 2025. The application is now OPEN!
The Institute for Common Power partners with teachers, tutors, curriculum specialists, organizational foundations, and school system leaders across the country to provide an experiential learning opportunity for educators in the long historical arcs of Civil Rights, Voting Rights, and the African American experience in America. Truth in education is essential for democracy to work. We are dedicated to creating a nation of educators who understand and teach accurately, while being models for students to grow and work collaboratively in building a just and inclusive American democracy. These learning tours are led by Institute for Common Power Director, Dr. Terry Anne Scott; Common Power professor, Dr. David Domke; Institute for Common Power staff; and civil rights foot soldiers. Those who have participated often characterize the experience as “life-changing.”
THE APPLICATION FOR THE SEPTEMBER 11-16, 2025 INSTITUTE FOR COMMON POWER TRUTH AND PURPOSE LEARNING EXPERIENCE FOR EDUCATORS IS OPEN!
Educators will travel with people from the Institute through Georgia, Alabama, and possibly Mississippi (depending on the trip). We will visit, among other places, the Equal Justice Initiative Legacy Museum, Kelly Ingram Park, and Selma. Educators will learn from and travel with professors, civil rights foot soldiers and others. Those selected for the program will be named Institute for Common Power Ambassadors.
Teachers change lives! This journey it is not just about the history they learn: this journey helps educators better understand their students. It helps them better understand the power of their role in nullifying racism. It provides them with a community of other educators committed to changing lives.
The Institute will cover airfare, hotel rooms, ground transportation, meals, museum entrance fees, and speaker fees. Those who are selected required to create one unit of study with three lesson plans within thirty days of the completion of their journey. The unit of study will be available for free on our website.
If selected for the Truth and Purpose Learning Experience, educators will become an Institute for Common Power Educator Ambassadors. They then have access to all Educators for Democracy Initiatives, which include the following:
1. Free access to ALL lectures and courses given by the Institute for Common Power.
2. Eligibility to apply for the Tennessee / Mississippi Truth and Purpose Learning Experience
that focuses heavily on the Modern Civil Rights Movement.
*Accepted Educators will be given a scholarship that covers airfare, ground transportation, hotel, and meals.
3. Virtual monthly convenings with Educator Ambassadors from all of the cohorts.
4. Eligibility to apply for the Educator Symposium in Selma, Alabama.
5. Eligibility to apply for a $1,000 Education to Action Grant for the implementation of a
school or community-based program that moves education to action.
6. Ability to deliver a lecture during the Institute’s quarterly mini teach-in, entitled “Educators
for Democracy.” Those delivering lectures are paid a stipend.
7. Leadership opportunities in our Scholars in Motion program. This is a college prep program
for high school students who reside in government-subsidized housing.
8. The opportunity to knock on doors with Common Power. We will sponsor select Institute
Educator Ambassadors who wish to travel and knock on doors. If you are knocking on
doors, you are an Educator for Democracy.
“The Institute for Common Power and the Educator Learning Tours have completely changed both my personal and professional life.”
-Educator Ambassador
Testimonials from Past Participants
The Representatives of Our Eternal Dissemination of Truth.
Education to Action Grants
Institute Educator Ambassadors are educators who have participated in the Institute's Truth and Purpose Learning Tour through Georgia and Alabama. Upon completion of the experience, educators have access to additional Institute engagement and resources; they are eligible, for example, to apply for a $1,000 Education to Action grant to implement a school or community-based program that will move education to action.
Educators are the representatives of our eternal dissemination of truth.
Meet a Few of Our Chosen Grant Recipients!
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Meet a Few of Our Chosen Grant Recipients! 〰️〰️〰️
Yvens Berger
Awarded the $1,000 Education to Action grant to produce a podcast about African American history with and for his students to demonstrate, “the power of decision-making throughout history. History is not only a record of the past, but it is a record of human behavior. Human behavior that shows the consequences or the causation effects of their actions. If we can provide them with the history of human development from the start of human history, we can show them how society truly operates. This will give them tools to navigate life.”
Carmen Cruz
Awarded the $1,000 Education to Action grant to acquire supplies for a schoolwide afterschool National History Day event for students and their families to “engage in historical inquiry and project-based learning.” Utilizing the theme: The Power of Youth in the Historical Struggle for Change, students will present to the community documentary shorts, trifold presentations or live performances.
Jordan Lanfair
Awarded the $1,000 Education to Action grant to support the Literacy to Advocacy Initiative, which provides increased access to diverse books for marginalized communities in Illinois and New Mexico. “The communities we seek to serve have long been marginalized. We will be using this grant to increase the number of volunteers and resources while we support the necessary media attention, outreach to elected officials to draw attention to the work being done, but also what is needed.”
Simone Gordon
Awarded the $1,000 Education to Action grant to create a video series using place-based education to teach about the African American experience in early 19th century New York. Her class will visit sites in Brooklyn, NY and surrounding boroughs to “speak with activists and learn about the space in connection to the lives of Africans Americans; Through this project, students will continue the legacy of storytelling through truth-telling in the name of the preservation of history.”
Kate Ehrlich
Awarded the $1,000 Education to Action grant to create a traveling African American history exhibit. In early February, Ehrlich and her students held an opening for the exhibit to discuss their research and hopes for the project. Among the attendees was the chair of the Maryland Commission on African American History and Culture and three members of the Board of Education. The exhibit was on display until February 29th, with the mobile exhibit subsequently traveling throughout Frederick County Public Schools to supplement instruction in American History I, American History II, and African American Studies. After circulating, the exhibit is tentatively scheduled to be on display at Mt. Zion Church.
Russell Tribby
Awarded the $1,000 Education to Action grant to partner with a local Black-owned BBQ restaurant to provide a soul food meal to his students after a semester of learning about the work of enslaved chefs and their contributions to American cuisine. “In learning about individuals like James Hemings we build on previous lessons that explored what life was like for some enslaved people like Sally Hemings and the precarious positions they were forced into by some of the most traditionally notable figures in U.S. history. Our focus though is on how food and food production worked to shape a culture built on family and perseverance.”
Educators represent our ability to disseminate truth and shape next generation leaders. The Institute for Common Power is committed to supporting educators across the country and globe through conversations, learning tours, grants, lectures, trainings, and more.
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“Two of the student volunteers and I were able to present at the Frederick Historic Site’s Consortium’s Master Docent Conference…both students gave detailed explanations for the panels they had researched and answered questions from docents in the community. They were very well received. In April, I will be presenting about the project and how educators can engage in similar research with their students at the MD Council for the Social Studies Spring Conference in Crofton, Maryland.”
Why Are Teachers Applying for This Grant?
“I am applying for this grant to support my new cultural center that will service students in Escambia County and their families. My aim is to promote and preserve cultural heritage and provide high-quality culturally educational opportunities with special interests in African and African American history and the arts. I will use the funds to respond to the needs in the community by providing spaces in informal settings. History has proven that the youth carry a huge voice in the direction our local, state, and national laws branch out within our communities. It worked during the Civil Rights Movement, in the Year of the Return, and it will be effective in the future.”
“I am applying for a grant to fund a program to deepen the knowledge of people from low-income communities. People who lack knowledge tend to make bad decisions and… due to the lack of knowledge they are more susceptible to low quality information or the wrong information. If we can provide them with the history of human development from the start of human history we can show them how society truly operates. This will give them the tools to navigate life.”
“We will be using this grant to increase the number of volunteers and resources while we support the necessary media attention, outreach to elected officials to draw attention to the work being done, but also what is needed.”
“I am applying for the $1000 grant to enable me to implement a school program that will turn education into action. This program aims to help students understand various aspects of modern civil rights movements and to explore the long history of African American and how it relates to our modern world. The Education to Action grant will then allow me to implement this program of learning and also to include the creation of an artwork that will symbolize African American history and how it impacts our world today.”
“This grant will provide an opportunity for students to travel with EF Tours, their teachers, and classmates to historical Civil Rights monuments in Georgia and Alabama. Providing an opportunity for students to travel to the sites and places key to the turning point of the Civil Rights movement – prior to taking [AP African American Studies] – will allow them a level of access not provided to students in Spokane.”
“I am applying for the Education to Action Grant because of my firsthand experience with the power of place-based learning. Students will [be able to] learn through example. The grant funding would be a catalyst to launch the community oral history project, [where] a group of students and staff [go] on The Black Journey tour in Philadelphia... it would be incredibly powerful for our students to tell the stories of their communities in their communities.”
Do you wish to support us in providing endless teachers with supplementary educational funding by donating to our Education to Action Grant fund?
Click below!
If you would like for educators in your local school district to be considered for the Truth and Purpose Learning Experience for Educators, please submit an application or contact the Institute for Common Power Director,
Dr. Terry Anne Scott - terry@commonpower.org.