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This teacher needs your help!

Mr. McElreath from Durham, NC is requesting books through DonorsChoose, the most trusted classroom funding site for teachers.

See what Mr. McElreath is requesting

Reading the African-American Experience

My students need 26 books on African-American history.

  • $524 goal

This project expired on October 1, 2010.

This project expired on October 1, 2010.

Classroom photo
Mr. McElreath Durham School of Technology
Durham, NC Grades 9-12

My Students

Too much of the black history that students are exposed to is overly simplistic or condescending. Jean Yellin's carefully-researched edition of Harriet Jacobs' autobiography helps students to see the profound complexities in our country's racial history.

My students are motivated.

They chose to attend a high-quality school that requires a great deal of them in terms of student-centered and project-based learning. They work hard, and they deserve to be challenged with the best possible materials. The books this grant will fund will help me connect them to a part of their state's history while also tapping into larger themes in our country's conflicted racial past. My students will benefit from struggling to fathom the improbable but true life of Harriet Jacobs, a woman born into slavery who managed nevertheless to assert her humanity and eventually win her freedom.

My Project

We need 25 copies of Jean F. Yellin's version of Harriet Jacobs' autobiography, Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl. I read this work while getting my PhD in American history, and I think it is one of the best sources for helping students ponder the vagaries of the institution of slavery. We will read and discuss the characters in the book who demonstrate the full range of humanity, from the most courageous to the most depraved. The book is complex, refusing to indulge in simplistic stereotypes of either African Americans or whites. Though the book contains top-notch scholarship, it is exciting and entertaining enough to hold the attention of my senior-level high school students.

One thing students rebel against in a typical social studies class is the too-unfamiliar characters who populate the past.

Giving them the recognition that people in the past were just as complex as they see themselves can help us motivate them to a deeper understanding of both the past and themselves. Harriet Jacobs is not always an excellent role-model, but in her story there are many attributes that are worth emulating and that we all can learn from.

This project will directly impact historically underfunded classrooms.

More than half of students from low‑income households

Never Before Funded 25 students impacted
Mr. McElreath Durham School of Technology Grades 9-12

Celebrate Black teachers and kids! This project supports a Black teacher or a school where the majority of students are Black.

This project will directly impact historically underfunded classrooms.

Durham, NC View local requests

More than half of students from low‑income households Data about students' economic need comes from the National Center for Education Statistics, via our partners at MDR Education. Learn more

Never Before Funded 25 students impacted

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Where Your Donation Goes

Where your donation goes
Materials Cost Quantity Total
Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl: Written by Herself, with "A True Tale of Slavery" by John S. Jacobs Harriet A. Jacobs, H. Jacobs, Jean Fagan Yellin (Editor), Contribution by John S. Jacobs • Barnes and Noble $13.76 25 $344.00
Creating Black Americans: African American History and Its Meanings, 1619 to the Present Nell Irvin Painter • Barnes and Noble $31.11 1 $31.11

Materials cost

$375.11

Vendor shipping charges

 FREE

Sales tax

 $29.26

3rd party payment processing fee

$5.63

Fulfillment labor & materials

$35.00

Total project cost

$445.00

Suggested donation to help DonorsChoose reach more classrooms

$78.53

Total project goal

$523.53

Our team works hard to negotiate the best pricing and selections available.

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As a teacher-founded nonprofit, we're trusted by thousands of teachers and supporters across the country. This classroom request for funding was created by Mr. McElreath and reviewed by the DonorsChoose team.

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