We are thrilled to announce our third cohort of Zinn Education Project (ZEP) Prentiss Charney Fellows. The fellowship offers support for a cohort of people’s history educator leaders to study, learn, and organize together.
Purpose
Educators are at the center of battles over what history children will learn and the kind of future they will create. The right wing uses its immense wealth and the complicity of the mainstream press to fan the fires of bigotry and repression. To fight back, we need to support educators who will teach, organize, write, create, and build — like the 13 passionate and committed education activists who make up the 2026–2027 Prentiss Charney Fellows.
Meet the Fellows
Below are the educators selected for this third cohort of the fellowship.
Mueze H. Bawany
Chicago, Illinois
Francesca Caruncho
New York, New York
Eric Fishman
Boston, Massachusetts
De’Ana Forbes
Lilburn, Georgia
Ross Irons
Washington, D.C.
Julia Kirkpatrick
Portland, Oregon
Kate Merwin
Tacoma, Washington
Mel Molina
Los Angeles, California
HS Ethnic Studies and History Teacher
Kurt Ostrow
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
MS/HS English Teacher
Alexandria Rigonan
Detroit, Michigan
HS History Teacher
Courtney Wai
San Antonio, Texas
Greg Wickencamp
Iowa City, Iowa
Hannah Zieve
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
See the educators who made up the first and second cohorts.
Goals
Fellows will meet for six sessions over the course of 18 months, beginning in August 2026. This cohort will focus on writing K–12 curriculum — adding new teaching resources and perspectives to expand the collection at the ZEP website. Fellows will meet to elaborate and receive feedback on their projects, and work to field test, publish, and share their work.
The fellowship supports educators from around the country with teaching ideas from across subjects and grade levels. What unites all of their projects — and all ZEP curriculum — is the conviction that young people should be given opportunities to comment and act upon the world they have inherited. Students are not passive recipients of historical knowledge; like all of us, they are historical actors with the power to read the world and bend its course toward justice. This active, participatory approach to learning is what we call “a people’s pedagogy.”
Fellowship Name
The fellowship is named Prentiss Charney for two education activists who embody the spirit of this endeavor. C. J. Prentiss and Michael Charney spent decades together committed to radical education for young people and recognized that creating the conditions for that learning requires creative, grassroots organizing. Through their many years of work in Ohio, including both statewide and national work, they modeled the tenacity and strategic brilliance required to succeed against the well-funded right-wing institutions.
The Future
Help us fund the Prentiss Charney Fellows for the next five years. With secure funding, teachers can plan ahead to participate and we can continue to support the alumni as they interact with the media, present at conferences, organize, and offer workshops. Learn more and donate here.