[hr-education] Re: Human rights-based approach to schooling

Dear Abraham,

Our goal is to graduate students that are able to create meaningful,
productive lives for themselves. Beyond that, we hope that they become
adults that strive for a more just society where rights are respected. It
is a sad truth that the New York City city-wide drop-out rate is around
50%. By striving to provide each student with an education that respects
their style of learning and academic needs, we also hope to guarantee each
student the education to which they have a right.

With regards to your question about training, our teachers receive it from
many sources- school staff, outside organizations. HREA trains teachers in
human rights on an on-going basis. I work in the school full-time which
allows for professional development daily as I work with individual
teachers to infuse lessons with human rights themes. I often co-plan and
co-teach units or individual lessons with teachers.

Occasionally, we have school-wide professional development sessions. We
started the school-year with three-days of workshops. I recently conducted
a day-long workshop international treaty negotiation and the landmine
issue. These stand-alone sessions are a welcome break for teachers and
provide an opportunity for curriculum enrichment. Even without the
training, our teachers are committed to human rights and, especially, the
right to education. Some teachers may not feel comfortable or be
interested in speaking "rights language" in every class. We are confident
that students get it elsewhere through school-wide events and in other
classes.

I am not convinced that a human rights school needs to be in an
economically depressed neighborhood. All children have the right to learn
about human rights and study in school where those rights are respected. I
do think that providing a small-school experience, often only afforded to
the privileged, to students that would otherwise attend massive
educational institutions is an important rights issue. The students have
the right to an education that takes into consideration how they learn and
how they need to be supported. For this reason, I feel strongly that we
continue to serve disadvantaged populations and that similar schools open
in all sorts of communities.

Again, thank you for your words of encouragement.

Best,

Jessamyn

 
------
Jessamyn Waldman, Program Associate
Human Rights Education Associates (HREA)
School for Human Rights
600 Kingston Avenue
Brooklyn, NY 11205, USA
Phone: +1 (718) 771-4793
Fax: +1 (718) 771-4815

 

On Tue, 14 Mar 2006, Abraham Magendzo wrote:

>Dear Felisa, dear Jessamyn:
>
>I have read with much admiration, inspiration and motivation about the 
>School for Human Rights in New York. It looks to me not only an 
>interesting experience but also a challenging one. We as human
>rights educators can learn from this experience a lot. We can learn
>how human rights can be infused in the total curriculum, in the overt and 
>hidden curriculum; we can learn how to transfer human rights
>knowledge from the abstract into the concrete, from theory into
>practice; we can learn how to be consistent between the human rights 
>discourses and its application in day to day life.
>
>I would like, if you allow me, to formulate some questions:
>

<snip>

 

 

 
======== Global Human Rights Education listserv =======
Send mail intended for the list to <      >.
Archives of the list can be found at:
http://www.hrea.org/lists/hr-education/
**You are welcome to reprint, copy, archive, quote or re-post this
item, but please retain the original and listserv source.