Roaming the Halls Student Profile
Roaming the halls: GSE student unearths the hidden histories of founding Black mothers
BY DANIELLE LEGARE
Nick Kennedy was well into his career as a high school English teacher when he realized just how much was missing from his own K-12 education. Black women—integral figures in shaping American history—were conspicuously absent from the curriculum. Now, as both an educator and a doctoral student at GSE, Kennedy is working to change that narrative.
His involvement in “The Search for Founding Black Mothers”—a National Endowment for the Humanities-funded initiative dedicated to reclaiming the erased histories of Black women—has transformed his approach to teaching and research.
“Recognizing and really wrestling with that huge gap in my own education has been pretty paramount for my pedagogy,” he said.
Reclaiming the stories of Black women
“The Search for Founding Black Mothers” began as a research article by Gretchen Rudham and Candice Logan-Washington of Morgan State University before evolving into a month-long digital humanities institute for educators. Kennedy was selected as one of 30 teachers to participate in the summer 2022 program, where he engaged in an interdisciplinary exploration of the contributions of Black women throughout American history.
The project addressed historical erasure by analyzing archival silences, connecting with scholars and descendants, and developing curricular resources to bring these narratives into classrooms. Following the institute, Kennedy continued his work with “The Search,” co-authoring an article in Interdisciplinary Digital Engagement in Arts & Humanities alongside fellow educators and scholars.
His contribution, “Between Binaries in The Search,” examines the tensions between the digital and the physical, the local and the global, and the generative and recursive nature of historical reclamation.
Nick Kennedy, EdD student
He explores how digital humanities provide both a means to recover lost narratives and a tool to critically reexamine the way history is told.
Nick is with Cortnie Belser of CUNY. She is a coauthor of “The Search for Founding Black Mothers” piece.
Bringing “The Search” into the classroom
For Kennedy, “The Search” is more than an academic project. It is a call to action.
His high school students now engage with these recovered histories and challenge the omissions of traditional curricula.
“Bringing elements of ‘The Search’ into the classroom has facilitated powerful encounters in my high school English classes,” he said.
Moreover, Kennedy’s doctoral studies in GSE’s learning and teaching in social contexts EdD program have deepened his research focus. He is particularly interested in the accessibility and impact of Black studies curricula in predominantly white institutions.
According to LaGarrett King, professor of learning and instruction, Kennedy’s contributions to the GSE community have been impressive.
“He is unique in that he balances his identities as a secondary teacher and a scholar. He sees them as one and allows those identities to merge and are equally valuable in who he is. He seeks knowledge to not only better his students’ classroom experiences, but to improve himself as a human so he can attend to the needs of those who rely on him,” King said.
Expanding the conversation
While “The Search” remains a central pillar of his scholarship, Kennedy is also sharing his insights with broader audiences. Recently, he contributed an article to Ed Week titled “Can’t Teach AP African American Studies? Start a Club,” offering strategies for educators facing curricular restrictions.
Additionally, Kennedy serves on the Advisory Group for the Gilder Lehrman Institute's AP African American Studies Guide, a resource designed to support classroom instruction and student learning of the College Board’s AP African American Studies curriculum.
He is also a trustee on the school board of Solvang School District and teaches in Arroyo Grande—both in California—as well as works as a curriculum partner with the Colored Conventions Project. He recently served as chair of the Ambassadorship Committee for the National Humanities Center’s Teacher Advisory Council.
“The work I do in the classroom informs my scholarship, and my scholarship informs my classroom,” he said. “That symbiotic relationship is what I aspired to achieve through a doctoral program, and I couldn’t be happier with the decision I made, and I feel very fortunate to be a part of this community.”