Every February, a Black person is heard somewhere saying “we actually only get one month, THE SHORTEST MONTH, to show Black history??” February was chosen for a reason by the founding father of Black history week, Carter G. Woodson. The late historian is perhaps pleased that some high schools across the country have officially begun to show AP African American Studies for the primary time…and it’s for a couple of month.

The College Board, the organization behind America’s Advanced Placement (AP) courses, launched a pilot program for 60 high schools to show AP African American Studies. Amid right wingers using Black history as a political football to win over (i.e. scare) their voters into supporting conservative politicians up to now couple of years, schools quietly introduced this system this fall.

We all know most of us got the MLK, Rosa Parks, and mayybbbe Malcolm X trifecta of lessons during Black History Month in highschool. But here’s what else we hope is within the curriculum for the brand new AP pilot course.

01

Our ancestors weren’t just victims. Enslaved Africans took part in tons of of uprisings across the U.S.

Hollywood repeatedly depicts slave stories where we’re abused and downtrodden. But Black people didn’t just accept the horrors of slavery casually. There have been mutinies and rebellions throughout the Middle Passage and once Africans arrived on America’s shores. Enslaved Africans engaged in over 300 insurrections within the U.S. until the Civil War, in response to some estimates. Nat Turner’s rebel (depicted below) in 1831 was amongst them.

02

Rosa Parks was more militant than history books teach us

After Rosa Parks refused to offer up her seat on a bus in Montgomery, Alabama – a strategic move that helped spawn the Montgomery Bus Boycott—she faced immense backlash and needed to retreat to Detroit, Michigan. During this era, she supported the self-defense strategy of the Black Panther Party and called Malcolm X her personal hero.

03

The March on Washington wasn’t nearly voting and integration. It was largely about jobs and economic exploitation.

While conservatives like to butcher Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s legacy and cite his “I Have A Dream” speech, the 1963 rally where he delivered his famous words was about rather more than integration. The truth is, it was conceptualized and planned by two Black socialists, A. Phillip Randolph and Bayard Rustin, who gave it the complete name “The March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom.” The rally was inspired by labor issues and racist workplace discrimination they saw within the many years prior to the 1963 march.

04

Black people aren’t just liberal, moderate, or conservative. Many have been revolutionary.

The Black Panther Party was known for its militancy and the powerful aesthetic of Black people sporting rifles and rocking fros and all-black matches. However the Panthers were steeped in revolutionary ideology that influenced revolutions against colonialism in Africa. Those revolutions in turn inspired Black Americans at home. The Panthers (like Kathleen Cleaver, pictured below) were rooted in anti-capitalism and studied socialist and communist theory. Political education was actually a requirement for anyone who wanted to hitch the party.