The College of William & Mary has received a $1 million grant to help fund research into the legacy of slavery and racism at the school in Virginia as well as at the estate of fifth U.S. President James Monroe.
The university in Williamsburg said in a statement Wednesday that the grant comes from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.
William & Mary said the five-year grant will fund several initiatives. They include genealogy work as well as an oral history project documenting stories of descendants of enslaved men and women.
The project will be executed in part by the school's Lemon Project, which aims to rectify past wrongs by the school against African Americans. The project was established by the university's Board of Visitors in 2009 in response to calls from some faculty and students to investigate the school's history of slavery and racism.
Also involved is Highland, Monroe's former estate in Charlottesville, which is part of William & Mary.
This isn't the only effort William & Mary has made to confront its history. The school renamed two of its buildings in 2016 in honor of two African Americans related to the university. It was the first time the university had named campus buildings after people of color.
In April 2019, the school also settled on a design for its planned memorial dedicated to African Americans that were enslaved by the university.
