By Tashi McQueen
AFRO Staff Writer
tmcqueen@afro.com
As political efforts to revise and restrict Black history grow, it is important for parents and teachers to consider how they can preserve the truth of Black history and Black holidays by educating the youth.
Lawrielle West, owner and founder of KwanzaaMe, emphasized that Black culture survives and thrives by sharing the history and celebrating the culture with one another. KwanzaaMe is a company that helps people celebrate Black culture year-round.
“Whether it’s from family member to family member, student to teacher, or neighbor to neighbor, this history has survived because we’ve carried it in our voices, our homes and our hearts,” said West. “In a time when some people are trying to silence or re-write the past, it’s these personal connections and remembrances that keep the truth alive and the legacy of heritage strong.”
West suggests that families make their own Juneteenth traditions by hosting cookouts, get matching Juneteenth outfits that mean something to their family, plant a garden of remembrance, watch a documentary or share oral histories.
She also advises teachers and parents to seek out local museums, historical markers, cultural events or walking tours and request that the communities you’re a part of have Juneteenth programming.
In 2023, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis (R) led initiatives to revise Black history in schools to say it was beneficial to enslaved persons and rejected the College Board’s African-American studies advanced placement (AP) course.
Since the 47th president arrived in office on Jan. 20, he has rolled back federal inclusion, diversity and equity initiatives and created an environment where private businesses are discouraged from promoting Black initiatives and opportunities.
Using an executive order, the president aimed to reduce “the influence of a divisive, race-centered ideology” in the Smithsonian and prevent the institution from promoting “narratives that portray American and Western values as inherently harmful and oppressive.”
The Smithsonian has since closed its diversity office in response to the diversity and inclusion executive order.
With the Republican Party holding the majority in both chambers of Congress and the White House, larger scale roll backs and changes are largely possible making initiatives to maintain Black history crucial.
Darius Johnson, project director for the Chesapeake Heartland highlighted three practical ways to ensure that Black youth learn about Black History despite what is going on politically. Chesapeake Heartland is an online archive devoted to preserving and sharing Black history from the Chesapeake region.
Those three include compensating students to be storytellers, using local stories to deepen national understandings and turning history into a physical experience.
“When students are paid to participate in programs like Hip Hop Time Capsule, they don’t just consume history—they remix and reinterpret it,” said Johnson. “Now in its fifth year, the program empowers students to turn archival materials—family photos, gospel tapes and historical documents—into original songs, poetry and visual art. This approach frames hip hop as historical collage, helping youth make sense of the past, provides them with real-world creative and job skills, and a $1,200 stipend for two weeks of experiential learning.”
Johnson suggests teaching students about national icons such as Harriet Tubman, Frederick Douglass, Gloria Richardson, but says youth should have the opportunity to pair those stories with narratives from their own families and neighborhoods to make it more personal. He said it helps them see that their family names and towns are part of America’s broader freedom story.
“History becomes real when students walk where it happened,” said Johnson. “Since 2024, every fifth-grader in Kent County has joined our African American history walking tours, developed with the Sultana Education Foundation and funded by the National Park Service. They leave not just with facts, but a felt sense that Black history lives right outside their doors.”
