Transatlantic Outreach Program

08/17/2026

Here at TOP, one of our favorite things is seeing how teachers translate their in into lessons and learning experiences for their students back home!

2026 TOP Fellow Rhonda O'Keefe shared how she made her 6th grade students a part of the experience by having them research Germany and create challenges for her to complete during the tour. Their challenges included ordering a Döner, finding examples of sustainability, and visiting historical sites.

Rhonda created a website where she documented completion of the challenges, as well as the lessons she created for her application and her post-tour lesson requirement.

Check out the website here: https://sites.google.com/view/top2026/home

Thanks so much for sharing your experience with us and with your students, Rhonda!

08/14/2026

TOP 3 took part in a during their to this summer! Their photos show how sustainability is a lived value woven through Germany's culture, society, education system, economy, etc.

Here are a few of the photos they snapped while on their tour! do you remember any of these from your study tour? What other examples of sustainability did you learn about?

08/13/2026

Over the night of August 12 to 13, 1961, the East German governmant began putting up a barrier of barbed wire and concrete slabs designed to stop its own citizens from fleeing to the West. Over the next 28 years, the Berlin Wall stood as a symbol of division and oppression, claiming at least 140 lives before it fell on November 9, 1989. Now 65 years later, the remaining parts of the Wall serve as a memorial to this time period and to its victims.

It is an honor for us to bring social studies educators to these memorials and historical spaces to learn about the division of Germany and to help them make connections to their own classroom instruction. Through them, their students are better able to understand the past and how those lessons can help us shape the world today.

, what were your experiences visiting the during your and how have you used this experience in your classroom?

Stiftung Berliner Mauer

08/11/2026

The 2026 TOP Study Tours have concluded and as our cohort of social studies teachers begin the new school year, they are also reflecting on their experiences from this summer and the connections they can make to their own classroom instruction. In this article by Eric Erickson, he breaks down specific lessons from today's that can help his students better understand important concepts in their courses.

https://www.monitorsaintpaul.com/stories/modern-germany-takeaways-from-a-teacher-fellowship,173469

As a social studies teacher at Como Park High School, Germany enters the scope of my U.S. History course at a predictable time. You can’t study the 20th century without recognizing the outsized …

07/21/2026

Today TOP 3 had the great honor to meet with a representative from the Stolpersteine project to learn more about the project and their important work to keep alive the memory of the victims of national socialism. We also visited a cross-generational housing project in and were able to learn more about initiatives to help people "grow old with vitaility."

It has been an inspiring ten days in 🇩🇪 and we have so much new information and so many new lesson ideas to bring home to our students and fellow teachers in the U.S.!

07/21/2026

07/21/2026

Yesterday TOP 3 had a fantastic visit at the Auswärtiges Amt in ! We were able to visit the archives to see some important historical documents and had the opportunity to meet with a representative of the Foreign Office to discuss the relevance of the -American partnership. 🇩🇪🇺🇸

07/15/2026

Today we had the honor of meeting with representatives of the US-Generalkonsulat Leipzig for a discussion about the important work they are doing in and the relevance of the German-American relationship! 🇺🇸🤝🇩🇪

In the afternoon we toured the city to learn about the history of the GDR and the courageous citizens here who took to the streets and brought about the Peaceful Revolution and eventual reunification of .