During a reception after the House passage of resolutions condemning the Chinese Exclusion Laws, Representative Mike Honda challenged the 1882 Project to continue the national educational effort by ensuring every high school text book on social studies and history contained at least one page of information on the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882. Shortly afterwards, the Asian Pacific Islander American Public Affairs Association (APAPA) convened conference in Sacramento to discuss this challenge. Information from that conference and continuing discussions through the 1882 Symposium led to a general consensus that revising standard text books was were not the most cost-effective approach to achieving our educational goals. A better approach was to affect state standards of learning to include in core curricula the topic of exclusion illustrated by the Chinese and Asian American experience.
Taking this approach and encouraged by support from the Chinese American Citizens Alliance and the 1882 Foundation, educators and concerned citizens have connected with State officials and local school districts in Virginia, Washington State and Oregon. Educators have developed lesson plans and teacher guides. The Chinese American Citizens Alliance plans to organize a national effort to catalog new and old lesson plans and establish a interactive central data base for educators and researchers.
1882 Foundation Lesson Plans
- Giving Meaning to the 14th Amendment (.docx)
- April 1968 (.pdf)
- Transcontinental Railroad at 150 Years – 1882 Foundation Teachers’ Workshop 5-11-19