Education – The UncommonWealth

Archives Manuscripts & Special Collections Newspapers

2026 Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month at the Library of Virginia!

According to the 2020 U.S. Census, out of the 331,449,281 people who reside in the United States, 7.5%—or 24,897,495—people in the United States identify as…

Cara GriggsMay 4, 2026

Unprocessed segregation correspondence boxes.

“Strife, Bitterness, Chaos and Confusion” : Desegregation in Virginia

In June 2024, we shared our experience processing correspondence related to segregation in the Governor Stanley papers. Thousands of letters were mailed to Stanley in…

Library of VirginiaFebruary 18, 2026

Archives Education & Programming Newspapers

Looking Back to Move Forward: Dr. Carter Woodson and the Commemoration of Black History

February 2026 marks the centennial of the first Negro History Week, established by Carter Godwin Woodson. The son of formerly enslaved parents, Woodson was born…

Library of VirginiaFebruary 11, 2026

Digital Projects Manuscripts & Special Collections

Ambition: To Be A Success

Ambition: To Be Successful In the 1950s and 1960s it was fashionable to ask high school seniors what their life's ambition was and to place…

Jessi BennettFebruary 4, 2026

Newspapers

Breaking [Old] News!

With nearly fifty titles recently added to Virginia Chronicle, there is a wealth of new historical newspaper content to explore. Community weeklies and dailies; military,…

Kelley EwingDecember 10, 2025

Digital Projects

The Denim Decade

In early 1971 students in Nansemond County petitioned the school board to change the dress code, specifically that "the female students be allowed to wear…

Jessi BennettJune 4, 2025

Digital Projects Education & Programming

Making History: Celebrating Student Transcribers for National Volunteer Week

Volunteering can deepen community connections and transform lives. In our Making History crowdsourcing program, Library of Virginia staff work with volunteers to transcribe historical documents…

Sonya ColemanApril 23, 2025

Archives Digital Projects

Documenting the Pandemic

Editors Note: Yesterday, March 23rd, marked the five-year anniversary of then-Governor Northam's closure of in-person education due to Covid-19. We've chosen to take this time…

Roger ChristmanMarch 24, 2025

Archives Digital Projects

Winter Magic: Snow Day Photos in Yearbooks

While yearbooks might conjure up thoughts of graduation, summer, and the end of the school year - snow days are a very common topic. The…

Jessi BennettJanuary 13, 2025

Newspapers

A Tool for Teachers: NDNP’s Race and Ethnicity Thesaurus for Chronicling America

Sites like Chronicling America, the Library of Congress’s database of over 20,000,000 digitized newspaper pages, and Virginia Chronicle, the Library of Virginia’s digital newspaper database,…

Kelley EwingSeptember 18, 2024

Education & Programming

Lessons from Lucyville

Now celebrated as a federal holiday, Juneteenth marks the date of June 19, 1865, when the Union Army arrived in Galveston and announced that the…

Guest ContributorJune 19, 2024

Archives The Stacks

“Yours in Utmost Disgust”: Desegregation Letters to the Governor of Virginia

How do archivists describe documents that reflect years of trauma and oppression with sensitivity? What if these documents are inflammatory letters written during an era…

Library of VirginiaJune 5, 2024

Archives Education & Programming Newspapers

Indigenous Education in Virginia

As soon as English colonizers established themselves in Virginia, one of their main concerns was the education of Indigenous people. The education implemented by the…

Ashley CraigApril 17, 2024

Manuscripts & Special Collections

“Easy to observe, difficult to explain and next to impossible to do”: The Locker Writing Method

On December 25, 1955, the Richmond Times-Dispatch ran an article titled “Decline of Penmanship.” An Associated Press piece by Arthur Edson, the article bemoaned “this…

Jessi BennettDecember 18, 2023

Archives Manuscripts & Special Collections

The End is Nigh

As another year winds down many of us may be thinking not only of endings, but also of new beginnings. New Year’s imagery usually includes…

Jessi BennettDecember 4, 2023