Applications Open for Educator Workshop in Shreveport
On Saturday, September 26, in Shreveport, the Louisiana Endowment for the Humanities will host an Institute for Louisiana Culture and History workshop for social studies K–12 educators in Northwest Louisiana. This regional workshop will focus on Louisiana’s Colonial-era history in alignment with the Louisiana Department of Education’s latest sixth-grade social studies standards.
The workshop will provide Louisiana public school social studies educators with the opportunity to build their content knowledge by engaging with historians and participating in social studies working sessions exploring how to use expanded standards-aligned content found on LEH’s 64 Parishes Encyclopedia in the classroom.
The institute will provide a $150 stipend to all regional participants on completion of the workshop. Social studies educators and specialists employed by public schools in Louisiana, with a preference for those working with sixth-grade social studies content, are encouraged to apply.
Applications close September 3 at 11:59 p.m. Applicants will be notified of their admission decision by September 7.
MEET THE SCHOLARS
Dr. Alexander Mikaberidze is LSU System’s Boyd Professor of European History at Louisiana State University-Shreveport, where he also holds the Ruth Herring Noel Endowed Chair. His scholarship is distinguished by its global perspective, emphasizing the interconnected nature of European, Atlantic, and Eurasian histories in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. He is the award-winning author and editor of over two dozen books, including The Napoleonic Wars: A Global History (Oxford, 2020) which was translated into seven languages and garnered the Gilder-Lehrman Military History Prize and the Society for Military History’s Distinguished Book Award. His latest publication is The Louisiana Purchase: The Grand Bargain and the Making of America (Oxford, 2026).
Louisiana social studies curriculum specialist Lindsay Bardes will lead hands-on teaching sessions. Bardes has been an educator in Louisiana for more than 15 years. Bardes earned her teaching certification from the University of New Orleans and her Master of Education from RELAY Graduate School of Education. After spending the first decade of her career teaching early elementary school, she transitioned to school leadership, teacher coaching, and curriculum writing. Bardes served as director of curriculum and instruction for social studies at ReNEW Charter Schools, and as schools manager at New Schools for Baton Rouge. She is currently the director of teaching and learning at GEO Academies, where she leads the advancement and implementation of professional development programs for teachers and leaders across the network and works as an educational consultant, providing professional development sessions and teacher resources for all things curriculum and instruction.
About 64 Parishes Encyclopedia and K-12 Educational Resources
Encompassing an award-winning quarterly print magazine and website, encyclopedia, and K–12 resources, LEH’s 64 Parishes explores Louisiana history and culture. 64 Parishes Encyclopedia hosts more than 1,200 entries about Louisiana accompanied by thousands of archival images, documents, and audio files. The encyclopedia is the LEH’s most-used resource, reaching hundreds of classrooms across Louisiana each year.
The Institute for Louisiana Culture and History expanded and adapted encyclopedia entries for the classroom. As part of the effort to better serve students and teachers, the Institute staff has also rolled out a search function that allows teachers to search content by Louisiana social studies standards numbers.
The LDOE, one of LEH’s partners on the 64 Parishes Encyclopedia expansion, introduced new social studies standards in the 2023–24 school year. The new course frameworks expand the study of Louisiana history and culture in the state’s public schools from third and eighth grade to nearly every grade. Together, LEH and LDOE mapped these new social studies standards to the content on 64parishes.org, creating resources for teachers and students, including grade-level appropriate adaptations of key texts.
The Institute workshops and 64 Parishes Encyclopedia expansion are made possible by the Patrick F. Taylor Foundation, the State of Louisiana, and the Louisiana Department of Education.
Please contact Program Manager Clare Shelburne at shelburne@leh.org with any questions.
