MARIETTA - Cobb County history teachers are getting a $1 million history lesson.

This week, the district was awarded a three-year, $999,425 grant from the U.S. Department of Education for the professional development of high school history teachers. The goal of the grant is to help history teachers better understand and appreciate traditional American history, so they can pass their enthusiasm for the subject on to their students.

Martha Battle, social studies department chair at Sprayberry High School, who helped spearhead the district's grant application, said the grant program will give teachers in-depth insight and first-hand knowledge of American history that will enhance their abilities to teach students.

"Teachers are eager for good-quality content enrichment, and this will allow them to be able to communicate and plan for better learning for their students," Battle said.

During each year of the grant, 30 high school social studies teachers will be chosen to participate in the development program. The program will include six history symposiums, book studies and teacher field trips. The district has teamed with two historians from Georgia State University and the Gilder-Lehrman American History Institute, a nonprofit organization promoting the study of American history, who will help lead the symposiums, book studies and field trips.

Battle said teachers will apply for the program and be chosen by the grant project director, who has not yet been designated. The teachers will go on several in-state field trips throughout the year and then travel to Boston and Philadelphia during the summer.

"The concept there is that, you know, from traveling, when you've been some place, you've felt the excitement of seeing that place and it's so much easier to share that excitement with your students - that intimate knowledge of location and history," Battle said.

As part of the grant, entitled With Liberty and Justice for All in American History, Battle said the district will be asked to track the performance of students whose teachers are participating in the grant program. The hope is that those students will have a better understanding of American history, and especially the documents that helped shape history.

Battle said she became aware of the grant from former colleague Michelle Luckett, who previously taught at Sprayberry before she left to take on the position of executive assistant to the superintendent. Luckett, who now works as a part-time history teacher and administrator at North Cobb High School, helped lay the groundwork for the grant. When she moved to the central office in September 2009, Luckett said she handed over her work on the grant to Battle, who had been her history teacher when she was a student at Sprayberry. Battle said she started writing the grant last winter and applied for it in March.

"For them to get this grant, for her particularly, was just the greatest gift I could give to her," Luckett said of her former history teacher. "For me, it was kind of emotional, because I think the world of (Battle)."

Luckett called the grant a huge win for teachers and said it will allow them to be immersed in history, so eventually they can take their experiences back to their students.

"A lot of students think that American History is the dullest class they can take," Luckett said. "When a teacher is able to bring history alive students become more engaged."