Students from YouthBuild Philadelphia Charter School learn about the history of coffee and are trained as baristas.

"For the Fund of the School District of Philadelphia, it’s a priority that the next superintendent has this unique trait of understanding and uplifting partnership development," says guest columnist Donna Frisby-Greenwood.

In this guest column, the three coauthors of the recent report "How the Pandemic Response Has Failed Young People" write letters to themselves from their descendants, imagining a future transformed by youth-empowering policies.

"For young people like myself, we did not have a safety net, we were the safety net," says Madison Nardy, a member the Youth Action Board of Community Legal Services, and a coauthor of its recently released report.

After a year out of classrooms and away from the traditional school environment, students need a chance to recover both academically and emotionally, says guest columnist Kathy Jacoby.

"One of the most valuable things our organization can teach people is that the lessons we can gain from studying the Holocaust are universal," says Eszter Kutas, executive director of the Philadelphia Holocaust Remembrance Foundation.

Despite what some politicians have suggested, research shows that learning to apply a critical race theoretical perspective and think critically about society do not fuel a sense of divisiveness among youth, says Villanova professor Jerusha Conner.

Legislators in several states, including Pennsylvania, want to ban teaching that acknowledges that the legacy of slavery, segregation, and other forms of institutional racism continues to permeate the social fabric of the nation.

In 2020, guest columnist Adam Clulow asked four undergraduate history majors to design a fully functional video game with a clear educational payoff. Now he believes the experience offers a template for transforming the humanities classroom.