MARSHA GRECO
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" Marsha was amazing! She shared her whole curriculum freely, was informative, gave the group the ability to collaborate and discuss, and overall made the online learning environment an easy place to learn" - 2025 Participant |
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MARSHA GRECO is a National Board Certified Teacher in Social Studies-History who has been teaching in San Diego, California since 2009 and is the Social Studies Department Chair at The Preuss School UC San Diego, where she has taught since 2014. She was one of the original 63 teachers nationwide and only four in the state of California that taught AP African American Studies in Pilot Year 1 (2022-2023) and was selected to be part of the first cohort of College Board endorsed AP African American Studies Workshop Consultants in 2023 to train teachers in Pilot Year 2 and beyond. Throughout the 2023-2024 school year, Marsha provided support to Pilot Year 2 teachers as a co-facilitator of monthly Office Hour sessions and a leader for extra support sessions hosted by the College Board. Since the summer of 2023, she has led AP Summer Institutes in both in-person and online formats. Marsha also serves as an AP Mentor for AP African American Studies teachers.
Marsha is also involved in assessment and development for the AP African American Studies course. She has created practice questions for AP Classroom and served as a Reader scoring Free Response Questions at the AP African American Studies Exam Reading since 2023. She has also taught AP United States History since 2015 and taught AP European History for eight years, and served as an AP Reader for both subjects at various times. Marsha has also led professional development sessions on teaching strategies and resources for AP African American Studies and AP US History at numerous national and statewide conferences. One of the highlights of her career was being a contributing author to the first edition of McGraw Hill’s AP African American Studies: From Slavery to Freedom, which was updated for the AP course from the original version by John Hope Franklin and Evelyn Brooks-Higginbotham. Marsha was honored with the 2024 Outstanding High School Teacher of the Year Award from the California Council for the Social Studies and in 2025 she was selected as the California History Teacher of the Year by the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History and was a top 10 finalist for the national award.
APSI COURSE DESCRIPTION
Course Description:
The AP African American Studies course is a transformative journey that places Black voices and experiences at its core as students delve into a rich variety of topics spanning from ancient African kingdoms to the contemporary world. Participants in this workshop will explore the interdisciplinary nature of AP African American Studies that examines the diversity of African American experiences through direct encounters with authentic and varied sources.
In this four-day online workshop, participants will engage in an in-depth examination of the course framework and components of the AP Exam, including the culminating Project. Participants will leave the workshop with resources, instructional strategies, and sample lessons and activities to design meaningful learning experiences for students.
The goals for the week are:
Agenda:
Day One
Understanding the Course Framework, Content, and Skills; Forming a Supportive and Collaborative Community
Day Two
Exam Format, Sample Questions, and Resources
Day Three
Course Project, Assessments, and Pacing
Day Four
Lesson Planning and Collaboration
Marsha is also involved in assessment and development for the AP African American Studies course. She has created practice questions for AP Classroom and served as a Reader scoring Free Response Questions at the AP African American Studies Exam Reading since 2023. She has also taught AP United States History since 2015 and taught AP European History for eight years, and served as an AP Reader for both subjects at various times. Marsha has also led professional development sessions on teaching strategies and resources for AP African American Studies and AP US History at numerous national and statewide conferences. One of the highlights of her career was being a contributing author to the first edition of McGraw Hill’s AP African American Studies: From Slavery to Freedom, which was updated for the AP course from the original version by John Hope Franklin and Evelyn Brooks-Higginbotham. Marsha was honored with the 2024 Outstanding High School Teacher of the Year Award from the California Council for the Social Studies and in 2025 she was selected as the California History Teacher of the Year by the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History and was a top 10 finalist for the national award.
APSI COURSE DESCRIPTION
Course Description:
The AP African American Studies course is a transformative journey that places Black voices and experiences at its core as students delve into a rich variety of topics spanning from ancient African kingdoms to the contemporary world. Participants in this workshop will explore the interdisciplinary nature of AP African American Studies that examines the diversity of African American experiences through direct encounters with authentic and varied sources.
In this four-day online workshop, participants will engage in an in-depth examination of the course framework and components of the AP Exam, including the culminating Project. Participants will leave the workshop with resources, instructional strategies, and sample lessons and activities to design meaningful learning experiences for students.
The goals for the week are:
- To achieve an understanding of the AP African American Studies course framework and the required sources
- To create a course pacing guide to incorporate the full scope of the course content as well as the Project
- To design, share, and explore lesson plans, resources, strategies, and assessments that provide students with the analytical skills and factual knowledge necessary to deal critically with the content, skills, and materials in AP African American Studies
- To understand the content and structure of the AP African American Studies exam and Project, and to develop appropriate strategies for maximizing student scores
- To connect with a large network of people to support transition into teaching the course
- To feel empowered to teach this groundbreaking course as it enters its first operational year and continue blazing the trail set in the two years of the pilot!
Agenda:
Day One
Understanding the Course Framework, Content, and Skills; Forming a Supportive and Collaborative Community
- Introductions and community building
- Equity and Access in AP
- AP African American Studies course overview
- Sample Lesson
- Course Framework overview
- Understanding Course Skills
- Course Framework deep dive
- AP Course Audit
- Reflections
Day Two
Exam Format, Sample Questions, and Resources
- Sample Activities
- AP Exam Overview
- Multiple Choice Questions
- Short Answer Questions (SAQ)
- Sample Short Answer Questions and scoring
- How to do the DBQ
- Sample DBQ scoring
- Digital Exam, AP Classroom Overview, and Instructional Planning Report
- Reflections
Day Three
Course Project, Assessments, and Pacing
- Project overview and rubric
- Teacher Manual, Submission, and Rubric
- Oral Defense, Exam Day Validation, Plagiarism/AI Policy
- Project Sample Analysis
- Approaches to the Project
- Explore the Project Manual
- Best practices for planning your course
- Creating your course pacing guide
- Homework: Design a sample lesson to share
Day Four
Lesson Planning and Collaboration
- Teaching a Studies Course
- Sample Lessons Presentations
- Further Exploration
- Lesson presentations
- Final reflections and farewell