Overview

"...Our work should illuminate the essential connection between social studies learning, democratic values, and positive citizenship. As a people, then, our first priority, is to ensure our survival as a free nation through the development of students who can assume the office of citizen. And so each and every social studies educator must be willing and able to give birth again to the American dream; in each new generation; in each new child."
 
Mission Statement 
 The Social Studies Department has a firm commitment to the ideal that the role of the social studies teacher is to extend the promise of full scholarship and citizenship to each and every person in the United States. The central focus of this goal is the design and implementation of social studies education as a liberating force in the life of every citizen. To achieve such a vision of social studies, we must insure that students become intimately acquainted with scholarship, artisanship, leadership, and citizenship. These mutually inclusive attributes are the hallmark of excellence in social studies--a program where students will gain the necessary knowledge, skills, and attitudes to understand, respect, and practice the ways of the scholar, the artisan, and the citizen.
 
Vision Statement
An exemplary social studies education aspires to nurture the growth of human talent. The scholars, artisans, and citizens which we aspire to shape should exhibit the following talents in pursuit of this service:

  1. They listen and learn.
  2. They read and understand.
  3. They can talk appropriately with anyone.
  4. They can write clearly and persuasively and movingly.
  5. They can solve a wide variety of puzzles and problems.
  6. They respect rigor not so much for its own sake but as a way of seeking truth.
  7. They practice humility, respect, and self-criticism.
  8. They understand how to get things done in the world.
  9. They nurture and empower the people around them.
  10. They connect.