Colorado teacher prepares to teach first AP African American History class in Douglas County
A Highlands Ranch teacher is getting ready to crack open a textbook and teach Advanced Placement African American Studies for the first time. This is also a first for the Douglas County School District.
"What's a motif again?" English teacher Valarie Moses asked students in her AP Literature class at Highlands Ranch High School.
"Yeah! A reoccurring symbol, idea, image," Moses said after a student responded.
Come next school year, Moses will have another class to teach: AP African American Studies.
"The idea is that it is a studies course. So it does history, it teaches literature. It covers visual analysis. It looks like it looks at data analysis as well," Moses said. "It starts from African kingdoms in Africa, and kind of moves through slavery, the diaspora, and up through political and protest movements up to the present day."
The new AP course is already being taught in some Denver and Cherry Creek schools.
"I had a couple of students come approach me and say they really wanted the course at the school. They had a petition, a list of other students that wanted to take it," Moses said.
After leading efforts to get the course approved in Douglas County, Moses is now preparing to teach it, reviewing the textbook, attending a weeklong class from AP, and meeting with a Cherry Creek teacher already teaching the course.
She spoke to the school board in favor of the course after some community members raised concerns.
"I think some of the concerns were that it was teaching critical race theory, that it's indoctrination. Some of the concerns were that it teaches Marxism," Moses said. "Or that it teaches like an oppressor, oppressed mentality."
Moses says the course doesn't teach any of those things.
"What it does teach is the history, the literature of a culture, the formation of it," Moses said. "And that is an incredible thing to celebrate, rather than to feel like it's perpetuating a sense of victimization. I think, in fact, it can give students a sense of empowerment."
In December, the school board unanimously approved the course. Highlands Ranch High and Mountain Vista will be the first schools in Douglas County to teach it in the fall.
"This school, in particular, our student population is changing every year, and we're becoming increasingly more diverse, as is the country. And I think it's important to honor that, recognize that, see it," Moses said. "I think we do need a space where we can teach this because we don't know what they don't know."
Moses believes it's critical education for everyone in the predominantly white district.
"This is about American history and American culture, and this is an important, huge chapter in American culture. And I don't think you can understand American culture without understanding African American culture," Moses said.
She's reviewing the textbook, attending a weeklong class from AP, and meeting with a Cherry Creek teacher already teaching the course.
There are already 26 students registered for the course at Highlands Ranch High School.
