A largely important part of any digital project or work of scholarship is being able to apply this to a larger audience, especially using it as a pedagogical tool for students K-12. For most K-12 students in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, the importance of Boston remains largely in the colonial context and its importance of the American Revolution. One sentiment of Ed Logue, the urban planner of the "New Boston" wanted to emphasize was that the city was not dead, and cities evolve into new forms.
It is a hope that students and others who interact with this digital project are able to place it within a larger understanding of the US in the 20th century, the long Civil Rights Movement, and the Great Migration. I encourgage anyone to use the questions below as a guide, particularly within the K-12 curriculum, and elaborate on them as they see fit.
Grades 5-8
- Have you ever been to Boston? What do you think of the buildings downtown?
- If you could change things about Boston's building or structures, what would it be?
- Who do you think makes the decisions in how cities are built? Do you think more people should be included? Less people?
- If you were to build a public housing project, what things would you consider? (location, etc.)
High School - US History II
- How does this story situate itself about what you know about Boston in the 20th century?
- How does this story situate itself in what you know about the 'Great Migration' of Black workers out of the South?
- In what way does the tenant activism confirm or elongate our current understanding of the Civil Rights Movement? Do you think it should go past the conventional "King-centric" narrative?