What is the Troutbeck Symposium?

By Tarajia Morrell

Photographer: Joshua Simpson

The Troutbeck Symposium is a student-led historical educational forum. It returns for its third consecutive year at Troutbeck in Amenia on May 1-3, 2024. Middle and high school students from 14 regional public and independent schools gather to listen, present, and discuss findings of their research projects uncovering little-known local histories of communities of color and other marginalized groups that tie to our national fabric. Like their celebrated predecessors, students will gather at Troutbeck to reveal truths—sometimes uncomfortable ones—in a significant site in the history of American thought and social movements, to discuss their findings with educators and distinguished guests.

On Wednesday, May 1 at 6 pm, Troutbeck and The Du Bois Forum will co-host a dedication ceremony for a new historical marker commemorating the Amenia Conferences of 1916 and 1933—two pivotal moments for the NAACP, strengthening the organization leading up to the Civil Rights Movement—that took place at Troutbeck.

“Every Troutbeck Symposium is momentous, fascinating, emotional, and most importantly, about discovery, but this year the addition of the historical marker ceremony, which we co-host with The Du Bois Forum, is particularly poignant. This achievement, manifested by students, is the essence of what the Troutbeck Symposium is all about and one of many examples of what is possible when the community gets together to support educators,” says Charlie Champalimaud, Director of Programs at Troutbeck.