The Governor-General's Award for Excellence in Teaching
On January 20, 2020, the Governor-General of Canada, Julie Payette, hosted the annual “Governor General’s Excellence in teaching of History Awards that recognize recipients' efforts to further an interest in Canadian history and heritage, and honor exceptional achievements in five areas: teaching, museums, community programming, scholarly research and popular media.” For individual teachers and teaching pairs, there are only six awards given every year for teachers. Honored at this year’s award ceremony was our very own OCAC Suzhou Head of Secondary division, Mr. David Brian, for Excellence in Teaching.
Mr. Brian was awarded for his part in the Lost Cemeteries Project that was a collaborative project involving his colleague’s, Mr. Stephen Punga, grade 12 history class and Mr. Brian’s grade 11 geography class at Académie Ste-Cécile International School in Windsor, Ontario, Canada.
Mr. Brian’s initial inspiration for this project came from two places. The first was a project that he was involved as a student at Harrow High School in Essex in the 1970s. His teacher used cemeteries as a primary resource to teach the student in their history class about the settlement history of Essex County. Before the project began, Mr. Brian reached out to his former history teacher to share and discuss the details of the project. The second was a Canadian Broadcast Corporation (CBC) story that highlighted “Ms. Elise Harding-Davis, a local author and historian, who has dedicated her life to preserving and protecting cemeteries throughout Essex County, Ontario. Ms. Harding-Davis has spent countless hours researching and writing about cemeteries in the region.” Given the proximity of Detroit, USA to Windsor, Canada, Essex County was one of four major avenues into Canada for African Americans escaping slavery via the “Underground Railroad” between 1860 and 1865. As a result, there is a deep connection between Essex County and African heritage and culture.
Mr. Brian and his class of grade 11 geography students began their project during Black History Month (the month of February in the United States and Canada). The method of geotagging tombstones onto a digital map is made possible through the use of Geographic Information Systems (GIS) technology.
This project led the students to partake in many different learning engagements that had real connections. Some of those connections included the City council of Essex, ESRI (ESRI a GIS tech company with an office in Toronto), HEIRS, local historical society and outreach to the community members of the churches and fields where the cemeteries are located. In order to locate the tombstones, the students of Mr. Brian’s geography class and Mr. Punga’s history class went out into the field and collected the data using geo-technology tools, specifically Survey123, an ESRI app. This field experience was a vital ingredient to the success of the project, because it allowed students to go outside the classroom, make connections, and invite the community back into the classroom. The students geo-tagged over one hundred tombstones in Southern Essex County, and identified features of the tombstones, such as cemetery name, surname on the headstone, other names on the headstone, the oldest date on the headstone, type of headstone, and condition of the headstone. For the students, who were mostly boarding students from China, the culture of caring for the tombs of relatives who have passed on is a deeply important cultural aspect. During the field research, students were shocked to see the state of some of the tombstones and how poorly they were maintained. This appreciation for the sanctity of tombs made this project important for the students, because they knew they were contributing something immensely important to the community. If they could locate and tag the tombstone, it would be easier for relatives and historians to locate them.
Please join us in congratulating Mr. David Brian on this honor for his dedication to Service in Action teaching and learning that led to this project and his effort being recognized across Canada by the Governor-General, Ms. Julie Payette.
Information in quotations and photos used were obtained from:
https://www.nationalgeographic.org/maps/undergroundrailroad/
https://ascis-geo.maps.arcgis.com/apps/webappviewer/index.html?id=d87cfefb909b4dddb6057f16c3077c97
https://www.gg.ca/en/activities/2019/governor-generals-history-awards-presented-rideau-hall
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/windsor/hidden-cemeteries-essex-county-1.4513193
