Mar 8, 2020 3 min read

Black History Month is a month of remembering all the contributions and accomplishments of African American people. These multitude of achievements should not be lumped into a single month of learning. We should dedicate everyday to learning about everyone’s history, not just a single race in our society on a particular day. We no longer need to separate our lives and should combine our histories that we have made together. Everything is already intertwined with each other and couldn’t have happened without the other. So we shouldn’t just teach about what happens separately, we should learn from it and add our own unforgettable histories together.

The creation of Black History Month has caused a separation between the other months and causes this question to go around in my head,”Why is there only one month dedicated to the learning of our black history?” Black and white people are no longer at war with each other and are now allies. We should never segregate ourselves in any other way again, which is how I see the creation of Black History Month as. The definition of being an ally is to unite and to have cooperation with each other, so we should not divide our histories from each other like they are separate. When in fact they are interlaced together and can not be separated from each other. But the world has divided our histories up into sections, like they aren’t one and the same. Most schools teach us a certain curriculum throughout the year, until Black History Month comes around and we drop everything we are doing to participate in Black History Month. Then they go back to their regular agenda in the curriculum once the month ends.

In African American History we have fought for the freedom we have today. By having to fight for our equal rights, against slavery, and even segergation. There is no one person who has accomplished these feats but a large number of people of the past. Which is why we are known to celebrate Black History Month, but it needs to be expanded to more than just a month of learning. It needs to be taught every day of our lives because these accomplishments were achieved with perseverance and are never to be forgotten. The important factors of our history is that we wouldn’t have had to fight for our freedom without white people. They are included in our history just like African Americans are included in their history. So we should learn about them and remember our combined histories together.

In conclusion, our histories are always going to be entangled with each other and we should try to enrich our learning more by integrating all of our histories together. Doing this might allow the people who still see us as a divided race, now together as allies. Like how the African Americans wanted us to be in the past. They fought for the life I have today, allowing me to appreciate the freedom they couldn’t experience. History is being made every day by every single individual in the world. So shouldn’t we learn about it all together on an everyday basis?

Naeveh Hightower is an 11th-grader at Washington High School. She is the daughter of Misty Hightower of Washington.