News & Events

BLACK HISTORY MONTH gave Civic Circle students an opportunity to explore voting and voting rights through activities and art. Students created a voting rights timeline, which included the passage of the landmark 1965 Voting Rights Act. They illustrated their timeline with hand-drawn posters, created “I Voted” stickers, and wrote voting rights raps. They also wrote their own poems and songs about voting with teaching artists Malachi Byrd and Damon Modarres, and created movement to accompany

Join Us in Comedy for a Cause! Gaithersburg’s “Community Comedy Club” features comic Davin Rosenblatt on Friday, March 1 and Saturday, March 2 at Give a Hoot to help raise funds for The Civic Circle, which teaches students seven “steps to democracy” through music and the arts. A bonus night of comedy at Give a Hoot, the Good Karma Comedy Festival, will also benefit The Civic Circle on Thursday, February 29. You have THREE CHANCES

HELPING OTHERS is the fourth “step to democracy” in Civic Circle workshops, a civic skill we call: Join! In January, our students learned about the legacy of Martin Luther King, and his maxim that “Everybody can be great … because anybody can serve.” Students learned about service-learning in Maryland, and did a volunteer activity coordinated by the nonprofit group Kits to Heart, which gives curated “care kits” to cancer patients and their loved ones. Students reflected on what it would be like to

THE CIVIC CIRCLE EXTENDS GRATITUDE to the generous funders who have recently stepped forward to support our ongoing expansion in 2024. We are thrilled to be among 95 nonprofits awarded $10,000 apiece for operating funding through the Maryland Humanities Marilyn Hatza Memorial SHINE Grant Program. SHINE (Strengthening the Humanities Investment in Nonprofits for Equity) is the perfect acronym for this program, which helps us all shine a light in the darkness through the humanities. WE ALSO THANK THE ARTS AND HUMANITIES COUNCIL of Montgomery County for its recent

OUR “CIVIC SPARK” CELEBRATION featured many highlights, including inspiring comments from a robust array of community and civic leaders. Michele Waxman Johnson shared her plans to celebrate the nation’s 250th anniversary throughout Maryland as head of the Maryland 250 Commission. (We all got to practice saying “Semiquincentennial!”) Michele Waxman Johnson Montgomery County Executive Marc Elrich spoke of his own years as a teacher, and of the importance of starting lessons in civility and respect at a young age.