Harpeth Hall students create a Current History Community

Harpeth Hall students created the Current History Community to facilitate non-partisan, student-led discussions about current issues and their relationships to historical moments — going beyond classroom discussions and broadening perspectives within the community. The group, which meets approximately twice a month, welcomes all students, faculty, and staff to attend and join the conversation.

The student founders see this community as an important way to connect current events to historical ones. They choose topics based on conversations around campus that alert them to what other students are thinking about, always trying to avoid politically charged agendas.

“The Current History Community falls under the umbrella of Public Purpose at Harpeth Hall,” said the group’s founding president, junior Priyanka Chiguluri. “Our main consideration is to create a space where everyone can speak to and learn from one another.”

The inaugural meeting for the 2021-2022 school year, considered “Protected vs. Unprotected Speech.” After watching a video that provided background on what each category of speech includes, attendees reviewed the U.S. Constitution’s First Amendment. With a goal to produce a written recommendation for protected speech for Harpeth Hall, meeting attendees then reviewed the Harpeth Hall Student and Family handbook and other internal school-wide guidelines regarding protected speech. 

With the mission to broaden perspectives and bring students and faculty together in this learning, Priyanka and the community’s vice presidents, juniors Amelia Olafsson and Lailah Rucker, hope to leave a legacy of inclusiveness and to one day expand the Current History Community outside of Harpeth Hall to include members of other area schools.