Oklahoma restricted how race can be taught. So these Black teachers stepped up

Using a plastic skull, archaeologist Alicia Odewale teaches a lesson about Tulsa's ongoing search for mass graves containing victims of the city's 1921 race massacre. She taught it at Black History Saturdays, a free private program designed for students to learn unvarnished lessons in African American history that teachers say a new law targeting race education has made harder to honestly teach. (Michael Noble Jr. for NPR)

TULSA, Okla. — The schoolchildren arrived at the community center's cafeteria on a Saturday morning, their parents in tow. Some adults came without children, because they, too, wanted to learn the African American history that a new law has made many Oklahoma schoolteachers too afraid to teach.

Kristi Williams, a leader and activist in Tulsa's Black community, led them in the pledge they recite each time they gather for a day of lessons.