Black History Month Is Over, So Now Is the Time to Start Planning for Next Year's BHM

If you want to get the most out of the month, don't wait until the last minute.

Feb 28, 2024

It happens every year, but we keep making the same mistake.

After the hectic activity of the holidays, we set our intentions and make our resolutions for the new year. But January is full is getting back into the regular rhythms of work, life, and school.

By the time we start remembering to write the new calendar year when we make appointments we realize it’s already February.

Oh no! What are we doing to do for Black History Month?

Perhaps you work for an organization or you’re a super organized person, and you’re never caught off guard with how quickly Black History Month (BHM) seems to come around each year.

But for the rest of us humans, we could use a reminder that looking ahead is a help.

Black History Month is over, so now is the time to start planning for next year’s BHM.

Here are three ways you can begin preparing for next year’s Black History Month right now.

Plan Your Events and Content Around the Official BHM Theme

Did you know there is an official theme for Black History Month every year?

Most people don’t realize this, but the theme is determined by the Association for the Study of African Life and History (ASALH).

ASALH was founded by Carter G. Woodson, and Black History Month—originally Negro History Week—was his brainchild. If any organization has the right and credibility to determine Black History Month themes, it is the organization founded by the person who birthed the original concept.

One way to get ready for Black History Month 2025 is to begin arranging content and activities around next year’s theme—African Americans and Labor.

The folks at ASALH have written an explainer to give context for the “labor” theme.

The 2025 Black History Month theme, African Americans, and Labor, focuses on the various and profound ways that work and working of all kinds – free and unfree, skilled, and unskilled, vocational and voluntary – intersect with the collective experiences of Black people. Indeed, work is at the very center of much of Black history and culture. Be it the traditional agricultural labor of enslaved Africans that fed Low Country colonies, debates among Black educators on the importance of vocational training, self-help strategies and entrepreneurship in Black communities, or organized labor’s role in fighting both economic and social injustice, Black people’s work has been transformational throughout the U.S., Africa, and the Diaspora. The 2025 Black History Month theme, “African Americans and Labor,” sets out to highlight and celebrate the potent impact of this work.
…
The theme, “African Americans and Labor,” intends to encourage broad reflections on intersections between Black people’s work and their workplaces in all their iterations and key moments, themes, and events in Black history and culture across time and space and throughout the U.S., Africa, and the Diaspora. Like religion, social justice movements, and education, studying African Americans’ labor and labor struggles are important organizing foci for newinterpretations and reinterpretations of the Black past, present, and future. Such new considerations and reconsiderations are even more significant as the historical forces of racial oppression gather new and renewed strength in the 21st century.

So as you think of speakers, events, books, and topics, bear in mind the official focus of BHM next year: African American Labor.

Plan for the Whole Month

When Negro History Week began back in 1926, it became evident over time that a single week could not do justice to the extensive contributions of Black people throughout U.S. history. In 1976, the week was expanded to an entire month we now call Black History Month, and even that is not enough.

Too often, however, our commemoration of Black History Month is a single day or a handful of random moments throughout February.

By planning ahead you can take advantage of the entire month to review, celebrate, and learn from Black history.

You needn’t plan an activity or content for every single day (but feel free to do so!). You can look at each week.

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For instance, you could begin the month by learning more about Carter G. Woodson, the organization he founded, and other details of his biography. You can also encourage people to follow and donate to ASALH.

Another week, you may plan a visit to a local museum. On another week, you can plan or attend a Black History Month event. A subsequent week can include watching a movie or documentary. And throughout the month, you can elect to read a book or series of articles to expand your knowledge of Black history.

You do not need to plan every Black History Month event yourself. Look at local organizations and participate in what they are doing.

Some places that usually do robust programming around BHM include: libraries, historical societies, colleges and universities, and museums. Check out their websites or contact someone, and you’ll soon have far more options than you could ever take advantage of.

Book Your Speakers Now

Now is also the time to start booking speakers.

As a historian and racial justice advocate, Black History Month is one of the busiest times of the year for me. If you want a particular speaker, it’s best to reach out to them right now before their schedule fills up.

Booking a speaker early also benefits you and your event. As someone who speaks dozens of times around the country each year, I can tell you that I do a much better job of preparing to make your event as effective as possible if I know about it far in advance, we can have some conversations ahead of time, and I can ponder the topic more deeply.

Yes. I am available for booking.

email: info@jemartisby.com

Try to focus on the year’s Black History Month theme when choosing a speaker and their topic.

Who are the best speakers and experts to talk about African American labor?

You can also think beyond the traditional mold of who people typically invite to speak during Black History Month.

Your speakers do not have to be professional scholars or people in high positions. They can be people with compelling lived experiences or descendants of historical figures.

Just as long as they are folks with some background with the theme and can talk about it in a compelling way.

Be sure to compensate these speakers well for their *labor* so you do not reiterate the pattern of Black labor exploitation and under-compensation.

You get out of Black History Month as much as you put into it. Let 2025 be the year that you get the most out of this valuable opportunity to remember the life and contributions of Black people.