Montgomery County Teacher Selected for Free Educational Opportunity

December 2, 2020

(Baltimore, MD) – Dr. Jermaine Ellerbe, who teaches at Eastern Middle School in Silver Spring, is one of 58 teachers selected for a National History Day® (NHD) fall professional development program. The virtual program focuses on using online Library of Congress primary and secondary sources to develop and support student research skills. In this program—a feature of NHD’s membership in the Library of Congress Teaching with Primary Sources (TPS) Consortium—participating teachers will collaborate for several months with each other and National History Day staff to build knowledge for teaching with primary sources. Upon completing the course, Dr. Ellerbe and his peers will have demonstrated the ability to pair Library of Congress resources with active learning strategies.

Dr. Jermaine Ellerbe, a lighter-skinned Black man, with glasses and a closely-shaved hair cut, wears a navy blue polo. He sits on a leather chair in front of a world map. Next to the map on the right, is a blow-up globe. On the map's left, is a red box that says "Kids' Road Atlas."
Image courtesy of Dr. Jermaine Ellerbe, pictured

Dr. Ellerbe participates in Maryland Humanities’ Maryland History Day program, an affiliate of National History Day. For Maryland History Day, students create original documentary films, exhibits, performances, research papers, or websites exploring a historical topic of their choice on an annual theme. Affiliates of National History Day include all 50 states and the District of Columbia, American Samoa, Guam, Puerto Rico, the Northern Mariana Islands, and international school programs in China, South Asia, and South Korea. The 58 teachers selected for the professional development opportunity represent 40 of National History Day’s affiliates across the country and around the world.

“I am looking forward to gaining skills and the experience searching the Library’s website for primary sources and utilizing them to convey National History Day source support to students,” says Dr. Ellerbe. “Additionally, I hope to demonstrate the ability to pair Library of Congress resources with pedagogy to inspire, engage, and support my young scholars.”

National History Day Executive Director, Dr. Cathy Gorn, says: “This course has particular value now as teachers and students continue to address challenges of non-traditional learning settings required by the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. The crucial skills Dr. Ellerbe is learning and honing over the course of this series will benefit his students for many years to come,” she adds. “As a Library of Congress TPS Consortium member, we are incredibly fortunate to be able to offer this opportunity for teachers.”

Along with NHD, Maryland Humanities is also a member of the Library of Congress TPS Consortium through a partnership with Maryland Public Television and Maryland State Department of Education, funded by the Library of Congress. Through this membership, Maryland History Day at Maryland Humanities has created 190 online history inquiry kits for use by educators and students engaged with research. The kits examine social studies/history themes and allow for students to select a research topic of interest and analyze themed primary sources from the Library of Congress and other online resources. Our TPS Consortium funding also supports two week-long professional development workshops for Maryland educators held each July in partnership with Salisbury University and the National Archives. The inquiry kits, a dozen interactive learning modules, and other resources can be found at thinkport.org/tps.

 

Press Release