This February marks 100 years since Carter G. Woodson established Negro History Week in 1926 – an insistence, in the face of exclusion, that Black life and achievement would be studied, named, and remembered, not “overlooked, ignored, and even suppressed.” His response was to institutionalize the study and commemoration of Black history—to create structures that would ensure these stories could never be erased.

A century later, we’re still fighting and facing similar challenges. While we’ve expanded Negro History Week to Black History Month, we’re also witnessing renewed attempts to remove Black history from classrooms through book bans and curriculum restrictions. But here’s what those who seek to erase this history miss: Black history isn’t just something we study one month a year. It lives in every family’s story, every community’s resilience, every relationship that crosses lines once drawn to divide us.

At Parent Teacher Home Visits, we see Woodson’s legacy not just in commemoration, but in action. Just as Woodson institutionalized the study of Black history, PTHV has spent more than 25 years institutionalizing something equally essential: relationship-based family engagement that centers the voices, experiences, and strengths of Black families and families of color in schools. Our model emerged from Sacramento ACT’s community organizing tradition—the same grassroots work that has always sustained Black communities when institutions failed them. When educators learn to recognize and honor Black families’ stories, they also build the skills, humility, and habits of listening that help them connect more deeply with every student and family they serve.

The theme of this year’s Black History Month, “A Century of Black Commemorations,” reminds us that “Black history’s value is not its contribution to mainstream historical narratives, but its resonance in the lives of Black people.” This truth also shows up in every home visit. When a teacher sits at a family’s kitchen table and learns about a grandmother’s migration from the South, or a parent’s experience navigating two languages, or a student’s cultural traditions that shape how they see the world—that’s Black history being honored in real time. These stories stand on their own, without anyone’s stamp of approval or permission. When educators make time to listen, they gain a fuller picture of each child, and that understanding becomes the soil where trust, relevance, and real learning can grow for Black students and, ultimately, for all students whose histories have been left at the margins.

We know that about 80 percent of our nation’s educators are White, and most serve communities where Black students and students of color make up the majority. That demographic reality does not have to lock schools into repeating old patterns. It can also be a starting point—a call for educators to lean into curiosity instead of assumption, to build relationships that bridge difference, and to see Black families not as outsiders to the system but as essential partners in reshaping it.

Over the past several years, we’ve deepened our commitment to racial equity work—partnering with the National Equity Project, conducting extensive training, forming workgroups to strengthen our practice and training. We’ve interviewed and reflected with hundreds of educators about how they navigate differences with families. These conversations reveal the gap between knowing history and changing systems, and the invitation to meet that challenge in daily practice.

These moments of connection, discomfort, and growth don’t come from a single school assembly or a once-a-year display.  Rather, they happen through sustained relationship-building work that requires educators to show up in families’ spaces, listen to their stories, and recognize their strengths. Every home visit becomes a quiet but powerful affirmation that Black families’ experiences belong at the center of school decision-making, not at the edges. And when we practice that kind of listening with Black families, we strengthen our capacity to welcome and honor all families.

Woodson famously wrote that “the American Negro must remake his past in order to make his future.” At PTHV, we’re building on that insight: We’re remaking relationships to remake schools. When educators and families come together as partners, when cultural assets are recognized rather than overlooked, when a child’s home life informs rather than contradicts their school experience—that’s when real change begins.

And that is where engagement takes root and learning takes flight.

This work matters more than ever. In an era when honest history is being challenged, home visits create spaces where families can share their own histories on their own terms. When trust between schools and communities is fragile, particularly among Black and Brown communities, voluntary visits give schools the tools to rebuild what’s been broken.

Research shows our model reduces chronic absenteeism by 21 percent, increases the odds of scoring proficient on standardized tests, and educators consistently describe stronger relationships and renewed commitment to their work. But beyond the data, we see something equally important: relationships that honor the tradition Black educators have always embodied—the understanding that real education requires knowing and valuing the whole child and where they come from.

As we commemorate a century of Black History Month, I appeal to educators to commit to making history in our own communities. This February, and every month that follows, consider one relationship-building action you can take.

• Invite one family for a voluntary visit (or a phone conversation) focused on hopes and strengths.

• Ask – What do you want me to know about your child that doesn’t show up at school?

• Commit to replacing one assumption with one question.

Show up in a new way. When we observe Black history by listening deeply to Black students and their families, we are also practicing the kind of shared humanity that makes every student feel seen, safe, and ready to learn.

The work of equity isn’t finished when we close the history book. It continues every time we choose connection over comfort, every time we center the voices that have been silenced, every time we create schools where all families see themselves reflected and valued.

We honor Woodson’s legacy and celebrate Black history—not just by commemorating the past, but by transforming the present.

Andrea Prejean is Executive Director of Parent Teacher Home Visits.