Dr. Margaret Peterson Receives Funding from the National Writing Project

Dr. Margaret Peterson received funding from the National Writing Project's "Building a More Perfect Union" grantmaking program.

The University of Maryland Writing Project (UMdWP) and Co-Director Margaret Peterson will partner with the Reginald F. Lewis Museum of Maryland African American History and Culture (RFLM) to offer professional development and facilitated curriculum writing workshop, Summer Institute for Grade 4-12 public school teachers.

The "Building a More Perfect Union" grantmaking program invites grant applications from eligible humanities organizations that have been significantly impacted by the coronavirus pandemic and would like to strengthen their educational programming and expand their reach to underserved communities. Grants assist local and regional organizations—including historic sites, archives, and public-facing humanities centers—in recovering from interruptions to their operations due to the coronavirus pandemic.

The workshops plan to provide facilitated curriculum writing workshops for teachers at two leadership tiers at the museum in the summer of 2022, support UMdWP teachers’ creation of a culminating project of public-facing curricular materials to attract and engage educational audiences at the RFLM, and pilot curricular materials with classroom audiences, including on-site or virtual field trips to the RFLM. 

The workshop also hopes to provide feedback to revise and refine curricular materials within professional learning communities and present teacher learning within a broader professional learning community audience to build the profile of RFLM and showcase teacher-made educational materials.

The relationship between the University of Maryland Writing Project and the Reginald F. Lewis Museum has grown over the years while focusing on addressing professional development in workshops. Creating workshops and curriculum tailored to teachers is a significant reason why the program has grown in popularity. 

"Teachers are most appreciative that our programs are teacher-made and teacher-led," said Dr. Peterson. 

Dr. Peterson is looking forward to this year's summer program. She is eager to see new teachers join the program and have previous teachers return. 

"The beauty is to bring teachers back that we have already had the opportunity to work with," said Dr. Peterson. 

Dr. Peterson is an Assistant Clinical Professor in the Department of Teaching and Learning, Policy and Leadership at The University of Maryland, College Park, where she instructs literacy courses for pre-service teachers in the Elementary Education and Secondary Education program.