Born into poverty in rural Georgia and raised under the shadows of Jim Crow segregation and the Great Depression, Alice Coachman fought through gender taboos and racial barriers to become a record-breaking track star. Then, in the 1948 London Olympics (the first to be held after WWII), she leapt to victory in the high jump and became the first Black woman in history to win Olympic gold. One of postwar America’s most high-profile athletes and the first African American woman to be spokesperson for a national brand, Coachman’s life and achievements were honored during the 1996 Atlanta Olympic games.The Woodson Center's Black History and Excellence curriculum is based on the Woodson Principles and tells the stories of Black Americans whose tenacity and resilience enabled them to overcome adversity and make invaluable contributions to our country. It also teaches character and decision-making skills that equip students to take charge of their futures. These lessons in Black American excellence are free and publicly available for all.

Economist, cultural historian, social theorist, and unwavering critic of misguided social policy and self-important intellectuals, Thomas Sowell is celebrated as one of America’s greatest writers for his insistence on telling unpopular truths. He’s the author of over 50 books, countless essays and articles, and 19 scholarly papers in economics. But his ideas have also been shaped by his own life story, one that took him from rural North Carolina to the streets of Harlem, from the Marine Corps to the halls of academe, and from Marxism to classical liberalism. It’s a journey that might surprise Sowell’s critics – and that students of all ages will find compelling, empowering, and a wonderful introduction to a brilliant mind. Made possible in part by the generosity of the Arthur N. Rupe Foundation.  The Woodson Center's Black History and Excellence curriculum is based on the Woodson Principles and tells the stories of Black Americans whose tenacity and resilience enabled them to overcome adversity and make invaluable contributions to our country. It also teaches character and decision-making skills that equip students to take charge of their futures. These lessons in Black American excellence are free and publicly available for all.

The popular economist Walter E. Williams was one of the most prominent libertarian commentators on issues of race, poverty, and prosperity, spreading his message through a weekly syndicated column, scholarly publications, and a variety of media appearances. Born and raised in the Philadelphia projects, Williams overcame personal and political barriers on his journey from blue-collar kid working odd jobs to a distinguished writer and professor. Prolific and provocative, Williams appealed to both specialists and lay people, and his great love was teaching economics. Throughout his life, a network of devoted friends, family, mentors, and colleagues made his success possible. The Woodson Center's Black History and Excellence curriculum is based on the Woodson Principles and tells the stories of Black Americans whose tenacity and resilience enabled them to overcome adversity and make invaluable contributions to our country. It also teaches character and decision-making skills that equip students to take charge of their futures. These lessons in Black American excellence are free and publicly available for all.

A century before the Civil Rights movement, this small town on Lake Michigan had racially integrated schools, churches, government, and civic organizations. Settled by Black and White pioneers in the mid-1800s, Covert Township worked across racial and ethnic lines at a time when doing so was widely rejected if not outright illegal. Learn the story of this remarkable community, told against the backdrop of Reconstruction’s overthrow in the South and worsening racial conflict in the North.When much of America was tearing itself apart and squandering the moral victories of the Civil War, this community nestled in the west Michigan wilderness came together — not as a utopian social experiment, but as ordinary people who relied on one another to solve the problems of ordinary life on the frontier, and whose legacy endures today in Covert and beyond. This little-known American story offers an example our country needs now more than ever.The Woodson Center's Black History and Excellence curriculum is based on the Woodson Principles and tells the stories of Black Americans whose tenacity and resilience enabled them to overcome adversity and make invaluable contributions to our country. It also teaches character and decision-making skills that equip students to take charge of their futures. These lessons in Black American excellence are free and publicly available for all.

On March 5, 1770, five men were shot dead by British soldiers on King Street in Boston. This event became known as the Boston Massacre, and helped kindle the fire of the American revolution. The first man to fall in this event was Crispus Attucks, a sailor and escaped slave of mixed African and American Indian ancestry. Patriot activists held up Attucks as a martyr for the cause of liberty, and generations of Americans followed suit; almost a century later, abolitionists made Attucks into a symbol of Black civic identity. But who was he, really? This lesson, the first of two on Crispus Attucks, tries to establish the facts about his life from the scant remaining evidence. The Woodson Center's Black History and Excellence curriculum is based on the Woodson Principles and tells the stories of Black Americans whose tenacity and resilience enabled them to overcome adversity and make invaluable contributions to our country. It also teaches character and decision-making skills that equip students to take charge of their futures. These lessons in Black American excellence are free and publicly available for all.

On March 6, 1857, the Supreme Court of the United States issued its infamous Dred Scott decision, which fundamentally denied the legitimacy of Black American citizenship. The coincidence of the date, one day after the anniversary of the Boston Massacre, caught the attention of William Cooper Nell, a free man of color, historian, and influential abolitionist. On March 5, 1858, antislavery activists celebrated Crispus Attucks Day at Faneuil Hall, where Attucks’s body had awaited burial in 1770. Such efforts to commemorate Attucks helped shape the field of African American history. This lesson examines the ways historians, civil rights activists, and cultural institutions renewed the memory of an otherwise enigmatic figure.The Woodson Center's Black History and Excellence curriculum is based on the Woodson Principles and tells the stories of Black Americans whose tenacity and resilience enabled them to overcome adversity and make invaluable contributions to our country. It also teaches character and decision-making skills that equip students to take charge of their futures. These lessons in Black American excellence are free and publicly available for all.

On the eve of WWII, Black American athletes like Jesse Owens and Ralph Metcalfe put the lie to Nazi ideas of racial superiority on Hitler’s home turf. This lesson tells the full story of the so-called “Nazi Olympics,” where athletes from nations that in only a few short years would be at war competed with honor—even as controversy brewed behind the scenes, including on the U.S.A. team. Students will examine the athletic competitions themselves, the achievements of American athletes, and the political controversies that loomed over the games, which resulted in two American Jewish athletes, Sam Stoller and Marty Glickman, being denied their chance to compete. Main presentation text by 1776 Unites scholar and Olympic historian Stephen L. Harris.  The Woodson Center's Black History and Excellence curriculum is based on the Woodson Principles and tells the stories of Black Americans whose tenacity and resilience enabled them to overcome adversity and make invaluable contributions to our country. It also teaches character and decision-making skills that equip students to take charge of their futures. These lessons in Black American excellence are free and publicly available for all.

Want to know more about the life and work of NASA’s “hidden figure,” whose calculations helped send men to the moon? This lesson tells the story of Katherine Johnson (1918-2020), the space program trailblazer who broke down racial and gender barriers in her remarkable 101 years of life. Born a math prodigy in segregated West Virginia, her father regularly drove Katherine 120 miles to the nearest school that would educate Black students past the 8th grade. Her extraordinary talents landed her a job as a “human computer” in the early days of NASA, where she would spend an illustrious 33-year career as a research mathematician. Johnson’s work on the Mercury and Apollo projects, along with her many other research projects and technical papers, earned her the Medal of Freedom in 2015.  The Woodson Center's Black History and Excellence curriculum is based on the Woodson Principles and tells the stories of Black Americans whose tenacity and resilience enabled them to overcome adversity and make invaluable contributions to our country. It also teaches character and decision-making skills that equip students to take charge of their futures. These lessons in Black American excellence are free and publicly available for all.

Paul Cuffe was a sea captain, entrepreneur, and philanthropist who lived through the birth and early life of the United States. As a young man, he helped smuggle goods past the British blockade during the Revolutionary War; by the early 1800s, he was perhaps the wealthiest Black man in the young republic, renowned and respected for his business sense and moral character and the first free man of color to visit The White House. An ardent abolitionist, Cuffe used his wealth to build one of the first integrated schools in America and to power his ambitious — and controversial — plans to build a new Black republic in West Africa.The Woodson Center's Black History and Excellence curriculum is based on the Woodson Principles and tells the stories of Black Americans whose tenacity and resilience enabled them to overcome adversity and make invaluable contributions to our country. It also teaches character and decision-making skills that equip students to take charge of their futures. These lessons in Black American excellence are free and publicly available for all.

In the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, Oklahoma was a haven for Black Americans seeking freedom and economic opportunity. The Greenwood neighborhood of Tulsa, with its bustling business district known as the “Black Wall Street,” was the nation’s most affluent Black community, a central hub of entrepreneurship and activism. But by June 1, 1921, Greenwood lay in ruins, victim to a massive wave of violence and looting committed by a mob of their White neighbors, in what is now known as the Tulsa Race Massacre. Against all odds, the survivors fought to rebuild their lives and livelihoods, even as powerful forces tried to bury Greenwood forever. This incredible story of dignity in the face of devastation shows the depths of human cruelty — and the heights of human resilience.The Woodson Center's Black History and Excellence curriculum is based on the Woodson Principles and tells the stories of Black Americans whose tenacity and resilience enabled them to overcome adversity and make invaluable contributions to our country. It also teaches character and decision-making skills that equip students to take charge of their futures. These lessons in Black American excellence are free and publicly available for all.