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-56- history, including major figures from the colonial and early Federal periods, the Civil War, and the later nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Relevant exhibiting dates back to the Gallery's widely-appreciated Bicentennial show, "Black Presence in the Era of the American Revolution," but more recently includes Black subjects in such varied contexts as the Swedish "Masterpieces from Gripsholm" and "American Colonial Portraits." The Gallery plans to include elements of particular interest to Afro-Americans in a major exhibition on the multi-racial America depicted by Winold Reiss, which will be up in about two years. Since 1986 public programming at the Gallery has included story telling, theatrical programs, and musical performances which have had special relevance to the Afro-American community, and the Gallery has undertaken a feasibility study for a series entitled "Cultures in Motion" which will examine the role of Afro-Americans and other minorities in shaping American society. National Zoological Park While its collections are animal based and have no specific linkage to any cultural Afro-American base, the National Zoo does emphasize the origins of the animals and thereby provides a kind of cultural-heritage link to those whose interests would include geographic origins. To augment that linkage the Zoo displays art objects from the regions of origin alongside the animals. The Zoo's public programs have included broad-based participation in such activities as the summer concerts and educational programs run in cooperation with the schools of the District of Columbia, and the Friends of the National Zoo will be making special appeals to the Afro-American community in the next two years to increase the number of their minority memberships. Office of Elementary and Secondary Education The Office of Elementary and Seconday Education has been integral to the Smithsonian affirmative action program since 1983 with its Career Awareness Program, under which District of Columbia Public High School students are introduced to career opportunities in Smithsonian museums in seven-week semesters each spring and fall. Outgrowths of the Career Awareness Program have included a job counseling and placement service for Program graduates, opportunities for Program graduates to serve as volunteers, a junior interpreter program that trains the Program graduates to serve as paid interpreters in museum galleries, a program of paid consultantships for Program graduates, and special events (seminars, exhibition tours, and receptions) for families of the Program students. The Office of Elementary and Secondary Education is also launching in cooperation with the Library of Congress and the Smithsonian Office of Folklife Programs a local history project involving elementary school teachers and students from the Petworth neighborhood in the District of Columbia. This summer the Office will also offer four courses with substantive Afro-American content in its 1988 Summer Seminar Series for D.C.-area teachers.
