got history? vision

Better History for a Better Future.

got history? is dedicated to strengthening our human ability to weave thriving, inclusive and sustainable communities by learning from the past. Buoyed by the positive impact we’ve made so far with very little resources, we are searching for like-minded partners and supporters to help us accelerate, scale, and bring our vision to life. Here’s why.

Our nation is being ravaged by the triple threat of a pandemic, deep divisions and misinformation. With a world full of conflict, volatility and complexity, people are seeking solace by retreating into passivity and tribal mindsets. This is putting the fragile and fairly new construct of democracy, in which a community is made possible by the notion of equality and acceptance across differences among free people, in grave danger.

Democracy and community are abstract concepts

for young people today. Teens are frustrated by an outdated school system in which their voices are not heard, and their educational and emotional needs are not met. The media that surrounds them is polarized and not geared towards weaving a consensus, reinforcing a shared purpose or presenting an objective set of facts. Advocacy and engagement become matters of individual choice to defend a specific cause but do not connect to a sense of responsibility for a civil body politic.

How we teach history in our nation

often does more harm than good. Despite reform efforts in the past decades, history is usually presented as a packaged meal, not as an invitation to think, inquire, discover, invent, lead and explore. Patriotic master narratives with a limited perspective cause feelings of exclusion. Many students graduate without having a clear understanding of how to tell truth from fiction and uninspired to contribute to their community. With this kind of history teaching, we have undermined the very foundational structures of a democratic system. The problem is not teachers. It’s a system full of barriers that prevent good teachers from doing what they know would work.

But our world needs young people who have got history.

Our world needs young people who are curious about how systems and cultures evolved into what they are today. Our communities need young people who connect with a concept of “we”, and with the ideals and values that underlie the freedoms that we so often take for granted. Our planet needs young people with a capacity to imagine a better future and who are eager to avoid the mistakes of the past. We all need young people who understand the power of humans to affect history and who have discovered their own ability to make change. Above all, we need young people who can tell a fact from a lie.

We at got history? open up new ways

for young people to engage with and learn real history in their communities. We see the power of real history to inspire young people as informed, empathetic, and inclusive leaders for the future. By giving young people a voice, creating learning ecosystems and weaving collaborations we expand access to history as a source of inspiration, healing and hope. We aim to remove the barriers that prevent young people and the communities in which they live from getting history.

Young people have never been included

in the design of history education, creating a 100-year history of a failed system in which 83%of students are not proficient in the curriculum taught. We are flipping the model by activating young people to voice their interest in high quality history so that they can be prepared to solve the problems that lie ahead. Our podcast is a first-ever collaboration between young people and leading historians, our national youth council is conducting the first-ever formal youth-led educational attitudes survey.

Cultural institutions have the unique capacity

to create a space in which free individuals can connect with the forces that bind us together as a human community. Museums, archives and libraries are the key to the creating the kind of inquiry-based, hands-on, locally rooted civic learning that young people want and need. We know how to create local learning ecosystems, creating a space for shared intent and collaborative, generative relationships between schools and museums that drive innovation and create new opportunities for high impact learning.

We believe in the power of weaving.

Wherever we can, we avoid designing our own content, and provide a framework to amplify the (often hidden) brilliant works that already exist instead.

As an open team-of-teams with an eye for academic, entrepreneurial and personal quality, we are constantly connecting innovations and insights into a collaborative force for change.

Our Vision

Our strategic vision builds on the experience we have collected in the past 2 years since our launch plus 15 years in the field of innovation and social entrepreneurship. We aim to plant seeds that will help millions of young people and adults find a new relationship with history so that they assume a more active role in the present and the future. We will pursue this goal through 4 strategic initiatives.

#1. We will expand our youth media enterprise. Our podcast UnTextbooked was met with enthusiasm by educators and young people alike. We are looking to not only create additional episodes, but to incubate further youth podcasting endeavors in the field of history.

#2. We will support and accelerate youth advocacy in the space of history education. We will work with our partner, the National Council for Real History Education to engage young people in the design of all learning experiences that we spread throughout our ecosystems. Building on the experience of our current youth survey on experiences with history, we will expand collaborations between youth and university research teams to ensure that they are getting answers to the really important questions and can pursue informed, targeted advocacy.

#3. We will spread our regional learning

ecosystem model across the United States. We have generated demand for our lowbudget, high impact model of weaving communities of intent that generate learning opportunities.

#4. We will collaborate with a network of organizations to change the conversation on why

history matters. With partners such as the People’s Supper, Reimagining Migration, Welcoming America, Center for Inspired Teaching, World Savvy, Dialog in the Dark, and others we will activate a national movement for museums to engage as providers of space for civil discourse and visioning for the future. We will continue to work with RoundGlass to shape a learning library on how to teach history to advance wellbeing and are partnering with High Resolves to reimagine the future of Assessment.

We can succeed in this vision because our team has the social, entrepreneurial and intellectual capital to access the top global expertise in any area that we aim to address. As radical collaborators who see our own growth as being dependent on the success of others, we are, by nature, a dynamic model and expect to expand and adapt the details of our plan in coordination with partners.

We are launching an ambitious capital campaign to fund the four initiatives outlined above over the next three years. We are aiming to raise $1m—an 8 fold increase of our current budget— to achieve national scale, reaching 1m young people by 2023. Building out our infrastructure now will allow us to support the healing of our nation at a critical time in its history.

Our founders, board and team members are all deeply mission driven and committed to achieving systems-change through creative collaboration and youth empowerment. Much of our success is due to the magnetic nature of the mission, which unlocked high levels of volunteer engagement. The total cash funds we have raised to date are $150,000, with an additional $500,000 in pro-bono services leveraged.

We’re creating a movement for better history.

We’re looking for partners who share our commitment to building thriving, inclusive and sustainable communities by learning from the past, like our founding funders, who have all been entrepreneurs. We seek like-minded investors from family offices and philanthropic foundations to join with us to bring this vision to life. Interested in partnering with us? Contact us at fernande@got-history.org