Grant to allow Salem Maritime site to engage students, teachers across North Shore | May 4, 2021

Salem Maritime National Historic Site is one of 32 parks and park partners to receive an Open OutDoors for Kids Hybrid Learning grant from the National Park Foundation (NPF), which works in partnership with the National Park Service and the park partner community to ensure that national parks reach their fullest potential and connect with as many people as possible. This grant will enable Salem Maritime to engage teachers, students, and families across the North Shore with the history of slavery, gradual emancipation, and Black empowerment in Essex County. The full list of grantees can be found on NPF’s website.

“Salem Maritime National Historic Site is honored to receive this grant from the National Park Foundation,” said Acting Superintendent Angie Alvino. “We look forward to working with teachers, partners, and the community to create educational outreach programs that connect students to unique and optimal learning environments. We are excited to engage in a variety of learning opportunities that will expand knowledge of our rich history and build relationships between the park and future generations to come.”

With more than 400 parks across all fifty states and the U.S. territories, the NPS traditionally hosts more than 60,000 in-park and distance learning education programs annually, serving over 1.8 million students.

Recognizing that the COVID-19 pandemic has shifted how and where students are learning, NPF collaborated with the NPS to facilitate a program design workshop in September 2020 with leading experts in evaluation, digital programming, community engagement, and national park leadership. The goal being to advise on how NPF and NPS can meet the needs of students, teachers, schools, and communities during these uncertain times and how lessons learned can be applied in the long-term. The workshop led to the Open OutDoors for Kids Hybrid Learning program, an extension of NPF’s Open OutDoors for Kids Field Trip program.

“National parks are America’s largest classrooms, and the National Park Foundation is committed to helping students, teachers, and families navigate learning during the pandemic and beyond,” said National Park Foundation President and CEO Will Shafroth. “From green time to screen time to family time, the National Park Foundation is helping the National Park Service and parks community engage students with educational opportunities across the country.”

At Salem Maritime, the Hybrid Learning Grant funds a virtual learning community for 3rd-8th grade teachers. In collaboration with The Hard History Project, NPS educators are working with teachers to co-develop and pilot new education programs. Using primary sources and artifacts, students will examine the history of slavery, the gradual process of emancipation, and the anti-Black sentiment that met Black empowerment. Exploring these stories will complicate or deconstruct the “free North” historical narrative and enable students to reflect on historic links to contemporary race-based disparities in Massachusetts. Teachers will share classroom strategies with a national audience of educators via recorded videos and webinars. Lesson plans and resources, including pre- and post-visit materials, will be available to future teachers visiting the park.

By empowering teachers and students to access resources at Salem Maritime and create place-based learning experiences confronting the history of slavery in New England, the NPF grant will help meet education needs through the pandemic and beyond.

Since 2011, NPF has engaged more than one million students in educational programs connecting them with national parks across the country. Earlier this year, NPF announced its goal to connect another one million students to parks over the next four years.

Thanks to private philanthropy, including support for Open OutDoors for Kids from Union Pacific Railroad, a premier partner of NPF’s Youth Education and Engagement initiative; Winnebago Industries Foundation; Niantic; Sierra; Columbia Sportswear; Parks Project; The Batchelor Foundation, Inc.; Humana; and many individual donors, NPF is investing nearly $1 million in the Open OutDoors for Kids Hybrid Learning program supporting communities across the country during the 2020-2021 school year.

Learn more about NPF’s efforts to engage students with national parks as classrooms.

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The above press release was submitted to us by the National Park Service.

About the National Park Foundation:
The National Park Foundation works to protect wildlife and park lands, preserve history and culture, educate and engage youth, and connect people everywhere to the wonder of parks. We do it in collaboration with the National Park Service, the park partner community, and with the generous support of donors, without whom our work would not be possible. Learn more at www.nationalparks.org.

About the National Park Service:
More than 20,000 National Park Service employees care for America’s 423 national parks and work with communities across the nation to help preserve local history and create close-to-home recreational opportunities. Learn more at www.nps.gov, and on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube.