When Phil Wilder stepped into his history classroom last year on the first day of school, he noticed something peculiar for the first time in the nearly 34 years he had been teaching at Moreau Catholic High School.

Among the posters of historical Americans on the wall were late presidents Abraham Lincoln and George Washington and others, but there were none of women.

The epiphany came after watching a television segment on a former student, then-U.S. Treasurer Rosa "Rosie" Rios, who had embarked on a mission to redesign the nation's currency, place abolitionist Harriet Tubman on the face of the $20 bill and pave the way for women to appear on the $5 and $10 bills.

After sending Rios an email, Wilder added posters of historical American women to the walls, including Tubman and suffragist Susan B. Anthony.

"It just really hit me that every day we can go through things, not see things and it may not register, but the fact that we don't have something can be just as important as something that we do have," Wilder said in an interview at Moreau.

What followed was a yearlong collaboration between Rios and Moreau to launch a nationwide initiative, called Teachers Righting History, that promotes the study of historical American women across all subjects.

The initiative officially began Aug. 26 at the school, coinciding with Women's Equality Day.

The goal is to have educators and students access a Treasury Department-compiled database created in the currency redesign process and other resources to "be creative and continue the discussion about our foremothers, as well as our forefathers, and really not just make this gender-centric but make it gender-neutral," Rios said.

To read the complete article, see:
Hayward: Former U.S. treasurer kicks off historical women educational project at Moreau high school (www.eastbaytimes.com/education/ci_30317071/hayward-former-u-s-treasurer-kicks-off-historical)