More children are able to learn about their community’s past because of a grant awarded to the History Museum on the Square. The $20,000 award is from the Melinda J McDaniel Charitable Trust at Bank of America.
Museum Education Manager Whitney Mosley said the money has been used to create a pool of scholarship funds "to help remove financial barriers for students in schools who want to visit the museum."
The grant will provide scholarships for around 770 students from regional and rural schools in southwest Missouri as well as private schools and homeschool groups.
Mosley said they want to make local history and civics education accessible to everyone.
"Many schools, especially rural areas or Title I districts, are struggling to find funds for field trips, so we applied for this grant with the goal to have scholarship money," she said. That helps fill that gap so when students come here, they can really experience history in this engaging, hands-on and interactive way that we provide and help them connect with their community no matter what the financial situation of their school or homeschool group is."
She said it’s important for kids to learn about their community’s past so they can think about how they’re part of its present and future. And history education helps young people learn about those who came before them.
"I think a lot of our programming is focused on sharing personal stories of people who really lived here in Springfield so they can connect and have some amazing role models but also have them critically think about challenges we face in our past that might be similar to challenges we're facing today."
