Kellen Akiyama: Making Connections with Students and History

Kellen Akiyama is a high school English and history teacher in Southern Oregon who proposed and implemented an African-American Studies course for history credit at his school a few years ago and was recently nominated for Oregon Teacher of the Year by the Oregon Department of Education. In this episode he shares the story of getting the course approved in a historically conservative town, some historical context of that town, and his own philosophy about teaching and connecting history to the lives of his students. He talks about his influences and motivations, the importance of relationships in teaching, and his views on the changes in education over the last 20 years and the reconciliation period he sees us in now.

Don't miss a great interview with "Aki" and a couple of his students about their perspectives on his class and how they have connected with it, and the experience of studying Black history in a rural small town, in this episode with Zachary Stocks on The Detour, a podcast version of the magazine, Oregon Humanities. 

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