Donations spotlight: Power the Zinn Education Project’s effort to teach people’s history in U.S. classrooms

Note from the CREDO Mobile team: This January, the Zinn Education Project is among three amazing groups that will receive a share of our monthly grant. Funding from the CREDO Mobile community will be vital to the nonprofit and support its campaign to bring students a more accurate, complex and engaging understanding of history than is found in traditional textbooks.

 Read this important blog post from the Zinn Education Project, then visit CREDODonations.com and cast your vote to help send much-needed grant money to the group to assist its efforts—and the efforts of our other outstanding January grantees.

The 2024 election revealed a troubling reality. Widespread miseducation and fear-mongering continue to shape political outcomes at the expense of people of color and marginalized communities.

This is why the right launched a nationwide anti-critical race theory campaign and book bans—to restrict teaching about systemic racism and erase the histories of immigrant and LGBTQ+ communities.

These attacks leave students and their families susceptible to rhetoric that scapegoats the most marginalized among us.

We cannot despair

SNCC veteran Courtland Cox asks: Who is going to control the narrative?

The answer is that we can shift the narrative if we equip young people with people’s history and critical thinking skills to make them impervious to lies.

When students learn about the mass deportation of Mexican Americans during the Great Depression, they realize that politicians today use the same divide-and-conquer rhetoric about “protecting jobs.”

When students study the climate crisis, they recognize the enormity of our predicament and learn strategies to address it.

A study of McCarthyism helps students recognize Red Scare tactics today.

When students learn about the Haitian revolution—the only successful slave revolt to create a new nation of the formerly enslaved—they are less susceptible to the sort of lies told during the election that demonized Haitian immigrants.

This is why we must support the educators who boldly teach honest, inclusive history. These teachers equip students with the tools to think critically, question harmful rhetoric and understand the systemic forces shaping the world. Supporting them isn’t just about protecting academic freedom—it’s about building a future where justice, not fear, guides public understanding.

Together, we can build knowledge and stop misinformation

You can take action by teaching people’s history lessons, forming a Teaching for Black Lives study group, organizing for the Teach Truth Day of Action, testifying at school board meetings against the censorship of social justice education and much more.

Together, we can ensure that future generations have the knowledge and critical thinking skills necessary to dismantle misinformation and build a more equitable world.