With increasing budgetary pressures on federal spending, your help is needed now more than ever to defend critical humanities programs. The National Coalition for History is a co-sponsor of the annual event.

For the preliminary program and other event information, visit www.nhalliance.org/events. To register online, click here.

Humanities Advocacy Day started in 2000 to provide an opportunity for the entire humanities community to convene, meet with their elected officials, and convey the importance of federal support for the humanities. Strong participation in Humanities Advocacy Day events is essential to our success in increasing public support for, and understanding of, the humanities.

The 2012 preliminary program includes:

• NHA annual membership meeting
• Presentations of current work in the humanities
• Panel discussions on the humanities role in research, education, public engagement and other policy areas
• Luncheon keynote address
• Humanities funding and policy briefing
• Capitol Hill reception
• Visits with Members of Congress

The ESEA bill passed 15-7, with the support of all the committee Democrats and Republican Senators Enzi (Wyo.-ranking member), Alexander (Tenn.) and Kirk (Ill.). The Casey amendment was agreed to by voice vote.

Thank you to all who responded to NCH alerts this week urging the HELP Committee to adopt the Casey “well-rounded” education amendment. It clearly made the difference.

“Well-rounded” education grants would be made from the U.S. Department of Education to the States. The States in turn would decide which Local Education Agencies (LEAs) receive funding through a competitive subgrants process. The amendment encourages partnerships with non-profit organizations, institutions of higher education or other state education agencies.

In addition to history, civics and social studies other subject areas eligible for grants include the arts; economics; environmental education; financial literacy; foreign languages; geography; health education; and physical education.

The new “well rounded” education program is targeted at low-income, high-need districts, which includes students with disabilities and English learners. The LEAs must identify in their application the academic subject areas for which they are seeking funds. This is keeping with the ideological thrust of the bill, providing maximum flexibility to school districts to spend federal dollars on what they identify as their own priorities such as professional development for teachers and the development and implementation of “high-quality curricula.”

History would be competing for funding with the subject areas mentioned above at the local level. So there would be no guaranteed federal funding stream for history professional development as there was under the Teaching American History (TAH) grants program, which would cease to exist.

While this is by no means an ideal solution, given the current emphasis on deficit reduction and drive to push decisions on education spending to the localities, it does ensure that federal funds will still be available for history education and professional development, albeit at a much lower level. We will continue to advocate for the restoration of the Teaching American History grants program; but with neither Congress nor the White House willing to keep TAH on the table, we also need to exert effective pressure in favor of the Harkin/Enzi bill that is actually in play.

Chairman Harkin has stated he intends to bring the ESEA bill to the Senate floor before Thanksgiving, with the hope a final bill could be worked out with the House by the end of the year. Whether that happens remains to be seen.

There is no comparable comprehensive ESEA reauthorization bill in the House. Instead a number of piecemeal bills addressing specific sections of the ESEA have been introduced. In May, the House Education and Workforce Committee passed H.R. 1891, the “Setting New Priorities in Education Act, which would eliminate 43 programs at the Department of Education including Teaching American History (TAH) grants.

Chaffetz introduced a bill during the previous session of Congress to restrict the grant-making authority of the NHPRC. During an oversight hearing on the NHPRC in June 2010, Chaffetz attempted to discredit the witnesses from the historical and archival communities, and made numerous unsubstantiated claims about grants he alleged had received NHPRC funding in the past. He maintained that the NHPRC duplicates existing programs at the National Endowment for the Humanities.

Last year, legislation to reauthorize the NHPRC at a $20 million level from fiscal year 2011 to fiscal year 2015, died in the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee.

On June 23, 2011, the House Appropriations Committee cleared a bill (H.R. 2434, H. Rept. 112-136) providing only $1 million for the NHPRC in fiscal year (FY) 2012. That figure constitutes a 90% reduction from the FY ’11 funding level of $7 million and is $4 million less than the Obama administration’s request for the NHPRC. The House is not expected to take up H.R. 2434 until after the upcoming August recess.

Representative Chaffetz would likely be prohibited from offering his bill as an amendment when the Financial Services and General Government FS & GG) FY ‘12 appropriations bill comes to the House floor. Any Member can raise a point of order questioning whether an amendment is considered “legislating on an appropriations bill” which is prohibited under House rules. Repealing an existing law falls under that restriction. However, nothing would prohibit Chaffetz from offering an amendment to strip the $1 million in proposed FY ’12 funding for the NHPRC.

Assuming no changes are made when the bill is considered on the House floor, advocacy efforts will shift to the Senate. There is no indication when the Senate Financial Services & General Government Subcommittee will meet to consider their FY ‘12 bill. Congress will be in recess the month of August until after Labor Day. Given what occurred last year, and in previous years, there will likely be a series of continuing resolutions to keep the federal government running after the start of Fiscal Year 2012 on October 1. So it is likely many months before any action will occur in the Senate.

The Nation’s Report Card: U.S. History 2010, Grades 4, 8, and 12 is available at www.nationsreportcard.gov. Additional information, including a summary of the report, is available at: http://www.nationsreportcard.gov/ushistory_2010/

U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan issued the following statement on the results of the U.S. History 2010 NAEP:

“The history scores released today show that student performance is still too low. These results tell us that, as a country, we are failing to provide children with a high-quality, well-rounded education. A well-rounded curriculum is key to preparing students for success in school and life. That’s why we’re putting a greater emphasis on courses like history, art, drama and music in our efforts to fix No Child Left Behind.”

The NAEP scores of lower-performing fourth graders have increased since 1994, according to the U.S. History 2010 assessment. The report, released today, showed some of the greatest gains by fourth graders since 1994 were among the historically lowest-performing groups. In the fourth-grade, there was a 22-point increase from 1994 to 2010 in the scores for students ranking in the bottom 10th percentile of performance.

In the eighth-grade, students whose scores ranked in the 10th, 25th and 50th percentiles were higher than in 2006.

Meanwhile, performance of twelfth-graders was only 2 points higher than in 1994, and there was no significant change in scores from 2006 in any of the five percentiles or racial/ethnic groups. In 2010, over half (55 percent) of high school seniors performed below the Basic achievement level.

“We are encouraged by the progress of our fourth and eighth graders, particularly by the gains being made by students who traditionally have been among the lowest performers,” said David P. Driscoll, chair of the National Assessment Governing Board, which sets policy for NAEP. “We need to bring even more of these students up to the Proficient level, and we want to see more progress overall by our twelfth graders, who will soon be active citizens.”

Broken down by racial and ethnic groups, Blacks and Hispanics in the fourth grade made larger gains (22 points and 23 points, respectively) from 1994 to 2010 than their White counterparts. And in the eighth grade, the increases posted by Black and Hispanic students since 2006 helped them narrow the gaps with their White peers.

Compared to 1994, average scores in 2010 for males were higher at all three grade levels, and scores for female students increased at grades 4 and 8. Males outperformed females in 2010 in grades 8 and 12. Although there was no significant difference in scores between males and females at grade 4 in 2010, the scores of male students were higher than in 2006.

NAEP results are reported as average scores on a 0 to 500 scale and as percentages of students scoring at or above three achievement levels: Basic, denoting partial mastery of the knowledge and skills fundamental for proficient work; Proficient, representing solid academic performance and competency over challenging subject matter; and Advanced, representing superior performance. The scores can be compared to those from 1994, 2001 and 2006 to show how students’ knowledge and skills have progressed.

The history assessment, a mix of multiple choice and constructed-response questions, was administered by the National Center for Education Statistics to nationally representative samples of public and private school students, including 7,000 fourth graders, 11,800 eighth graders and 12,400 twelfth graders.

Questions were designed to measure students’ knowledge and analytical skills in U.S. history in the context of four historical themes: democracy, including basic principles and core values developed from the American Revolution through the present; culture, focusing on how different racial, ethnic and religious groups interacted and the traditions that resulted; technology, focusing on the transformation of America’s economy from rural frontier to industrial superpower and its impact on society, ideas and the environment; and world role, the movement of America from isolationism to worldwide responsibility.

At grade 4, students who scored at or above the Basic level (73 percent) were likely to be able to interpret a map about the Colonial economy; students scoring at or above Proficient (20 percent) were likely to be able to understand that canals increased trade among states; students scoring at Advanced (2 percent) were likely to be able to explain how machines and factories changed work.

At grade 8, the 69 percent of students scoring at or above Basic were likely to be able to identify a result of Native American-European interaction; the 17 percent at or above Proficient were likely to be able to identify a domestic impact of war; the 1 percent at Advanced were likely to be able to explain two differences between plantations and small farms in the antebellum South.

At grade 12, the 45 percent of students scoring at or above Basic were likely to be able to understand the context of a women’s movement document. The 12 percent who scored at or above Proficient were likely to be able to understand Missouri statehood in the context of sectionalism; and the 1 percent who scored at Advanced were likely to be able to evaluate Civil War arguments.

H.R. 1891, the “Setting New Priorities in Education Spending Act,” would terminate 43 K-12 federal education programs, including the Teaching American History grants program, the House Republican leadership contends are wasteful, ineffective and duplicative. Teaching American History grants is the only federal program that funds K-12 history education.

The House Education and the Workforce Committee has cleared H.R. 1891 and it will go to the House FLOOR for a vote soon. It is important that you contact your Member of the House of Representatives TODAY to urge them to oppose this bill. We have set up a template message for you to customize. We strongly encourage you to personalize this message by telling Congress why TAH programs are important to you, your institution, your field, your state, and/or district.

The President’s fiscal year 2012 budget request for the Department of Education would eliminate Teaching American History grants (TAH) as a separately funded program. However, the Administration proposed consolidating history education into a new program called Effective Teaching and Learning for a Well-Rounded Education.

The Obama Administration DOES NOT support eliminating federal funding for history education, but rather moving in into a new competitive grant program. The Administration’s proposed Well-Rounded Education program would support competitive grants to States, high-need local education agencies (LEAs), and nonprofit partners to develop and expand innovative practices to improve teaching and learning of the arts, foreign languages, history, civics, economics and financial literacy, environmental education, physical education, health education, and other subjects.

The National Coalition for History strongly opposes this legislation. Contact your Member of Congress as soon as possible and tell them to oppose H.R. 1891, the “Setting New Priorities in Education Spending Act.”

The House and Senate still need to pass the budget bill (H.R. 1473) by the end of this week when the current continuing resolution (CR) expires. While there remains dissatisfaction on the right and the left in Congress with the deal worked out by the House and Senate leadership and the White House, the bill is expected to pass.

As noted above, the Appropriations Committee only released a list of reductions with no details and the bill language does not provide clarification in every case. Usually a conference report is issued along with an appropriations bill, giving agencies instructions on how funding should be allocated. However, it is unclear at this time whether or when a conference report will be forthcoming and what discretion agency heads will have at the programmatic level if it is not issued.

Teaching American History (TAH) grants (Department of Education):

The Teaching American History Grants program sustained a cut of $73 million
(-61%) down from $119 million in FY ’10 to $46 million. While this is disheartening, throughout the budget process House Republicans had repeatedly targeted the program for elimination. The Administration as well had zeroed out TAH for FY ’11 and proposed consolidating history education in a new Well Rounded Education program where it would have competed for funding with arts, music, foreign languages, civics, economics and other subjects.

So the fact that TAH survived at all is a major victory. Had the TAH program been eliminated it would have been nearly impossible to resuscitate it in the upcoming FY ’12 budget process and down the road in the pending reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA).

One question is whether the $46 million will be enough to fund new FY ’11 TAH grants. At a public forum earlier this year, Department of Education staff stated continuing grants would have priority in receiving FY ‘11 funding and any remaining funds would go to new grants.

In FY ‘08, the Education Department awarded three year TAH grants, but provided the option for the grantees to apply for additional funds for a fourth or fifth year. The FY ’08 grantees have been required to file detailed progress reports with the department and they are being evaluated to determine whether they merit additional funding.

The application deadline was April 4. However, there is no way of knowing yet how many FY ‘08 grantees applied for additional out-year funding and if they will qualify. As a result, given the limited amount of funds available, conceivably there could be no new TAH grants made this year.

National Historical Publications and Records Commission (NHPRC):

The NHPRC was cut $6 million from $13 million in FY ‘10 down to $7 million this year. While this is a significant reduction, the House in a previous CR had cut the NHPRC to a $4 million level and there were House Republicans pushing for outright elimination of the commission.

In FY ’10 the NHPRC received $8.5 million for grants. An additional $4.5 million was set-aside to fund a project to digitize and make the papers of John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, and George Washington available on-line. While the Founding Fathers Project is on-going, that funding was always intended as a one-time allocation to jump start the initiative.

Thus, the practical reality is that the amount of grant funding available to the NHPRC in FY ’11 was reduced by $1.5 million.

National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH):

The NEH budget was reduced $12.5 million (-7.5%) from the FY ’10 level of $167.5 million down to a level of $155 million. There had been a series of amendments to previous CRs in the House that would have imposed more draconian cuts in the NEH budget which were fended off by the advocacy efforts of the National Humanities Alliance.

National Park Service:

While no programmatic details are available concerning the Park Service’s history-related programs, two preservation programs were eliminated in one of the short term CR’s passed earlier this year. They had been targeted for elimination under the Administration’s proposed FY ’11 budget.

• Save America’s Treasures program–eliminated (-$14.8 million): These funds are used to make small one-time grants for specific local historic preservation projects to preserve a building or artifact which might otherwise be lost.
• Preserve America program—eliminated ($4.6 million): This program provides small grants to local communities in support of heritage tourism, education and historic preservation planning activities.

Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS):

The IMLS budget was reduced $44 million down to a level of $238 million. In FY ’10 the IMLS received $282.3 million, $16 million of which were congressional earmarks. The $44 million reduction includes the amount of those earmarks plus $28 million of cuts in programmatic funding. There is no breakdown available yet as to how the money will be divided between museum and library programs.

In recent weeks, the President has raised the public profile of K-12 education reform by making the reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) one of the major themes of his State of the Union address. Over a year ago, the Administration released its Blueprint for Reform detailing its plan for rewriting the law.

Neither party is happy with the results of the most previous reauthorization of the education law, No Child Left Behind (NCLB). This sentiment is largely shared across the country by governors, local school boards and administrators, and teachers. As a result, K-12 education reform may be one area where the partisan gridlock that has plagued issues like health care and deficit reduction may be broken. With a presidential and congressional elections looming in 2012, both parties see the potential rewards of working together on a popular issue like education.

On March 10, the President convened a bi-partisan meeting with Secretary of Education Arne Duncan and the eight key Democratic and Republican members of the House and Senate whose committees and subcommittees have jurisdiction over the rewrite of the ESEA. The meeting included Democratic Sens. Tom Harkin (D- Iowa) and Jeff Bingaman (D-NM); Republican Sens. Michael B. Enzi of Wyoming and Lamar Alexander of Tennessee; Republican Reps. John Kline of Michigan and Republican Rep. Duncan Hunter of California and Democratic Reps. George Miller of California and Dale E. Kildee of Michigan.

The Department of Education has encouraged states to work together to create “voluntary” common core standards. The Administration has also pressed for greater teacher accountability, charter schools, and giving greater flexibility to state and local officials. These are all potential areas of common ground with Republicans whose goal will be to reduce federal intervention in education at the state and local level.

One possible deal-breaker would be a reform bill that would require major increases in funding for the Department of Education. House Republicans have included cuts in education programs in each of the continuing budget resolutions that have temporarily prevented a federal government shutdown. And the fiscal year 2011 funding bill (H.R. 1) that passed the House a few weeks ago cut $5 billion from the Education Department’s budget and eliminated funding for popular programs such as Head Start. That bill died in the Senate last week.

In his March 14 speech, while noting the need for deficit reduction, President Obama said, “we can’t be reckless, and we can’t be irresponsible about how we cut. We can’t cut education. We cannot cut the things that will make America more competitive.” He went on to say with regard to education cuts, “I will not let it happen.”

At this point in the process, the Senate is far ahead of the House in readying a bill for the floor. Last year, Senator Harkin, who chairs the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee (HELP) convened numerous hearings on various aspects of the education law. His staff has been working with Ranking Member Enzi’s staff for some time now crafting a draft bill for HELP Committee consideration. The National Coalition for History has been urging Senator’s to preserve Teaching American History grants in the final draft. Senator Harkin has repeatedly stated that he wants a bill introduced by Easter.

The change of party control in the House has stymied efforts to hold hearings and craft a bill in that body. New Chairman of the Education and the Workforce Committee John Kline (R-MI) has not yet committed to a timetable for holding hearings and in the past has signaled that he prefers the passage of “targeted legislation” dealing with specific aspects of the education law rather than passage of an omnibus bill envisioned by Senate leaders. The Committee has also had to assimilate 11 new members, nearly half of the Republican majority, and bring them up to speed on the issues. In addition, the Subcommittee on Early Childhood, Elementary and Secondary Education has a new chair, Representative Duncan D. Hunter (R-CA) who is just starting his second term in Congress.

On March 14, Chairman Kline was quick to respond to the President’s call for passage of a reform bill by this fall stating, “As we develop targeted, fiscally responsible reforms, the Committee on Education and the Workforce continues to work with school officials and state and local leaders to learn about the tools they need to prepare students for the future. We need to take the time to get this right – we cannot allow an arbitrary timeline to undermine quality reforms that encourage innovation, flexibility, and parental involvement.”

Of particular concern to historians in the ESEA reauthorization is the future of K-12 history education. The House-passed version of the continuing resolution (H.R. 1) to provide funding for the remainder of fiscal year 2011 eliminated funding for the Teaching American History (TAH) grants program. The Senate version would have continued funding TAH at the FY 2010 level of $119 million. Neither of these bills passed the Senate however. As a result, TAH funding for the current fiscal year that ends on September 30 remains in limbo.

On February 2, the Department of Education announced that it was inviting applications for new awards under the Teaching American History (TAH) grant program for fiscal year (FY 2011). However, the Education Department made it clear that it was only accepting applications, “to allow enough time to complete the grant process before the end of the current fiscal year, if Congress appropriates funds for this program.”

The President’s fiscal year 2012 budget request for the Department of Education was sent to Congress in February and it once again eliminates Teaching American History grants (TAH) as a separately funded program. As it did in FY ’11, the Administration once again proposed consolidating history education into a new program called Effective Teaching and Learning for a Well-Rounded Education.

In FY ’11 the Administration proposed $265 million in funding for the new initiative. In FY ’12 that amount would be reduced to $246 million. The Effective Teaching and Learning for a Well-Rounded Education program would support competitive grants to States, high-need LEAs, and nonprofit partners to develop and expand innovative practices to improve teaching and learning of the arts, foreign languages, history, civics, economics and financial literacy, environmental education, physical education, health education, and other subjects.

Teaching American History Grants would be consolidated into this new program and would no longer exist as a free-standing budget line item. In fact, there would be no dedicated funding for any of the disciplines. In the competitive grants program, the various subjects would be pitted against each other for scarce resources. Such an approach could threaten schools’ and districts’ ability to provide each student with a well-rounded education, a result that seems to be the exact opposite intention of the Administration.

The National Coalition for History has been working closely with civics groups to preserve TAH as an independent program, or at a minimum, ensure that it receives a dedicated level of funding if it is indeed placed in the Well-Rounded Education program.

Both Democrats and Republicans in both houses have expressed a reluctance to fund programs in FY ‘12 based on the Administration’s proposed reorganization of the Department of Education set forth in the Blueprint for Reform. The preference would be to fund the agency as it currently exists until Congress enacts education reform legislation.

Legislation is currently being drafted in the Senate that would fund federal programs for the rest of this fiscal year, FY 2011. It is absolutely vital that our members send emails as soon as possible to save TAH and Civics funding in FY’11. We will be sending a separate sample letter regarding FY’12 appropriations and the reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) later this spring.

The immediate, critical first priority is to save these two funding streams in the FY’11 budget for the U.S Department of Education. The House of Representatives has already targeted TAH and civics education for elimination. However, the Senate is drafting its FY’11 funding bill now and there is still time to save these programs if we act quickly.

If you click here you will be directed to a sample letter. Please feel free to craft your own letter, the important paragraph to be sure you include is:

“To help our nation’s schools meet their civic mission to help students understand their rights and responsibilities as citizens, Congress should retain the Teaching American History Grants program and maintain federal funding support for civic education, while making the civics grants competitive. The civic education grants should go to non-profits with a demonstrated ability to deliver civic education programs, emphasis should be on programs serving currently under-served student populations.” You can put that in your own words, but be sure to get the points in that paragraph across.

Here is a link to the U.S. Senate website where you can easily find the email addresses of the Senators from your state.. To be effective, emails must come from constituents so only send them to your two Senators.

Please copy your letters to Civics.TAH@gmail.com so that those working the issue on the Hill will have a copy they can give the Senator’s offices.

If we lose the funding for these two vital programs at the Department of Education in FY’11 it will be very difficult to get that funding back in FY’12 appropriations and the ESEA re-authorization. That is why it is vital you send your e-letters to your US Senators today! Thank You!

The Battle of the Wilderness, fought May 5–6, 1864, was one of the most significant engagements of the American Civil War.

The National Coalition for History (NCH) is a member of the Wilderness Battlefield Coalition, an alliance of local residents and national groups seeking to protect the Wilderness battlefield. Collaborating with the Civil War Trust, NCH organized more than 250 American historians, led by Pulitzer Prize-winners James McPherson and David McCullough, in opposition to Walmart’s proposed construction plans.

In addition to NCH, the Wilderness Battlefield Coalition, is composed of the Friends of Wilderness Battlefield, Piedmont Environmental Council, Preservation Virginia, National Trust for Historic Preservation, National Parks Conservation Association, and Civil War Trust.

“We are pleased with Walmart’s decision to abandon plans to build a supercenter on the Wilderness battlefield,” remarked James Lighthizer, president of the Civil War Trust. The Civil War Trust is a member of the National Coalition for History (NCH). “We have long believed that Walmart would ultimately recognize that it is in the best interests of all concerned to move their intended store away from the battlefield. We applaud Walmart officials for putting the interests of historic preservation first.”

In August 2009, the Orange County Board of Supervisors approved a controversial special use permit to allow construction of the Walmart Supercenter and associated commercial development on the Wilderness Battlefield. A wide range of prominent individuals and organizations publicly opposed the store’s location, including. One month after the decision, a group of concerned citizens and the local Friends of Wilderness Battlefield filed a legal challenge to overturn the decision.