Beth B. Cohen is the Jewish Education Project Lead at Facing History and Ourselves. She has a master’s degree from the Harvard Graduate School of Education and a Ph.D. in Holocaust History from Clark University.
In this pilot, Facing History and Ourselves used its understanding of history to open students up to the notion of expanding their circles of caring.
Background
The Jewish Education Program at Facing History and Ourselves recently completed a three and a half year pilot program with eight Jewish day schools, four in the Boston area and four in the Los Angeles area, funded by the Jim Joseph Foundation. The goal of the program was to bring Facing History’s methodology and content across grade levels and disciplines to each of the schools in order to enrich the Jewish day school experience and reinforce the schools’ commitment to Jewish values of which Tikkun olam is central. Using some of its core resources including The Holocaust and Human Behavior, The Jews of Poland, and Sacred Texts, Modern Questions: Connecting Ethics and History Through a Jewish Lens, Facing History offered week long seminars in which over 60 teachers from these eight schools participated with the goal of returning to the classroom where they could use the lessons of history, the values embedded in Jewish sources, and contemporary issues in order to help students make their world a more humane and compassionate one.
Introduction
The notion of Tikkun olam is one that many contemporary American Jewish day schools, regardless of affiliation or definition of the term, claim as essential to their mission and school values. How to make this concept engaging and relevant for students, however, is a challenge that reverberates among Jewish educators. It is one of the questions that is at the core of Facing History and Ourselves’ Jewish Education Program, as well as at the heart of its Jewish Schools Partner Project, an innovative three and a half year pilot program funded by the Jim Joseph Foundation. The goals of this project were ambitious: to infuse eight day schools’ culture and curriculum with Facing History’s unique educational approach, thereby enriching the overall day school experience and strengthening core Jewish values, and, in particular Tikkun olam. Having recently concluded its third and final year, the Facing History Jewish Schools Project has much to offer schools on how the integration of innovative pedagogy and engaging content enhance day school environments that range from pluralistic, community schools to traditional, Orthodox boys’ and girls’ yeshivot.
How it worked
After an interview and application process, eight schools were accepted and each school contracted with Facing History to participate in a range of activities. These included professional development and ongoing follow up support for teachers, creating interdisciplinary project teams to root the work throughout each of the schools, and school wide events that were designed to help the further the schools’ mission. Facing History also coordinated semi-annual regional meetings in Boston and Los Angeles, as well as virtual “retreats” so that educators could discuss challenges, communicate successes and learn from each other on an on-going basis.
Once the contracting was complete, four teachers from each school attended a five-day Facing History’s introductory summer seminar for Jewish Educators using Facing History’s content and methodology. The goal of the seminar, and indeed of the organization, is to work with teachers to help them educate their students so that, through the lessons of history, they will work to make their world a more just and compassionate one. The approach follows a scope and sequence (see www.facing.org for a detailed description) that begins with questions of the individual and ends with a unit entitled Choosing to Participate, which encourages students to become “upstanders” (this term, coined by Samantha Powers in her book, Genocide in an Age of Hell, refers to an individual who chooses to take positive action in the face of injustice in society or in situations where individuals need assistance). By the third year of the program, over 60 day school teachers have attended our week long seminar at Facing History and Ourselves.
As part of the initial Memoranda of Understanding that each school administrator signed, s/he also agreed that at least one of the teachers on the team would teach a required 4-6 week Holocaust and Human Behavior class and others would infuse the content and pedagogy into other areas of the school. By including teams in the staff development seminars rather than an individual teacher, after the initial seminar every school had a built in support amongst their own staff as well as the ongoing assistance of a Facing History program associate. The team met regularly to infuse Facing History and Ourselves programmatic concepts and themes throughout the school – in classes and also in less formal settings like advisory groups, assemblies, hallway exhibits, parent events, and student projects. In this way the program worked on many levels to create a culture far beyond the classroom that engaged the students and encouraged the whole school’s commitment to tikkun olam.
Advisory programs were among one of the many components of the project adopted by various schools in which students explored societal and ethical questions in an informal atmosphere, whether by discussing, personal situations, responding to a short film or text from Facing History’s resource collection that highlighted a moral dilemma, or considering current events in America, Israel, or elsewhere. In this context, students and faculty were able to raise issues of both an academic and non-academic nature that have bearing on life inside and outside of the school. One school experimented with pairing a Judaic studies and general studies teacher as advisory co-facilitators in order to bring a Jewish perspective to advisory discussions. For example, one lesson used a short film entitled Pigeon (produced by Avodah Films) based on a true event about the experience of a woman in Vichy, France who spontaneously intervenes during an identity check on a train in order to save a Jewish man’s life. Advisory teachers were coached by their Facing History-trained colleagues to follow the viewing with a discussion of “bystander” and “upstander” behavior in conjunction with traditional Jewish sources that reflect a range of quotes from sources such as Pirkei Avot on the treatment of others (guides for lessons are available at www.facinghistory.org/jewished). Facing History materials offer many rich opportunities to connect Jewish history and values to situations occurring today. High school students in one Bible class argued over issues of leadership, the responsa of Rabbi Oshry of the Kovno ghetto and its biblical and contemporary relevance. Other students debated about the French legislation banning head scarves, a Maya Angelou poem entitled Masks and the connection of these resources and events to Purim and the wearing of kippot.
Often it was a teacher’s creativity, heightened by participating in this project, which made a difference. One teacher worked to help his students confront societal problems like the use of child labor by multinational companies. He showed a documentary called the Dark Side of Chocolate. The film is not a Facing History resource, but the teacher firmly believes that the foundations laid by the Facing History program enabled him to use this resource effectively, crediting Facing History with bringing about a “mentality change.” Exploration of the issue prompted a group of middle school geography students to research, and ultimately protest, the choice of chocolate bars in the schools’ vending machine.
Results
In every school the response to Facing History’s coordination of whole-school events has been impactful. All-school assemblies have included both local and nationally prominent speakers, including Holocaust survivors and community activists. In these presentations, Jewish values and universal concepts such as “democracy” are woven together to illuminate each other. Dr. Leon Bass, an African-American who fought in a segregated army unit during WWII and witnessed the liberation of Buchenwald at the end of the war, addresses students at the participating schools about his own experiences with discrimination both before and after the war. He speaks about how, after seeing concentration camp survivors for the first time, it evoked a profound change in his world view. He says he took off the blinders that caused him to have tunnel vision. He understood that suffering was not only relegated to him and his people, but that it was universal. This eventually led him to tell his story of what he witnessed that day in Buchenwald. Dr. Bass urged his audience to, “Be like Daniel and stand up for your beliefs.” In another instance two schools co-sponsored an event featuring Dr. Bass at a large local venue, and drew both students and adults from across the area. In the spirit of Dr. Bass’s words, the program included recognition of student “upstanders” from the two schools who were making significant contributions to improving their communities. The upstanders’ interpretations of Tikkun olam ranged from training volunteers at a local hospital to raising awareness on environmental issues. In yet another program, Dr. Terrence Roberts, one of nine African- American students who integrated Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas addressed a student audience about what motivated him to risk his life in the 1950s as a high school student in order to make the world a better place. Preparation for his visit drew from Facing History resources that included studying sermons from rabbis during the civil rights era and discussions about decision-making during critical times.
Still another outcome of the program’s emphasis on Tikkun olam has been collaborative projects between students in two participating day schools and two non-Jewish schools. In one Los Angeles school, a Facing History science teacher began a beautification effort of the Los Angeles River that included creating tile decorations with a Jewish Old Age Home that will be used to decorate part of the river that is undergoing recovery. Next year the school will join with a local parochial school in an underserved community to continue the beautification work. Similarly, a school in Boston has been meeting with a local Kipp school and using Facing History’s content and pedagogical strategies to foster communication between two very different communities. Eighth graders from two very different socio-economic backgrounds convene six times a year to jointly explore different issues and moments in history such as the Civil Rights Movement, hidden children of the Holocaust, and The Freedom Riders, with Facing History resources and pedagogical strategies so students begin to break down the barriers and learn to walk in each other’s shoes.
Has this project had the desired outcomes? Evidence, both statistical and anecdotal, suggests it has (Barr, 2010; 2011). According to teacher questionnaires, the greatest impact of the program on students has been in their attitudes and behavior outside the classroom. Teachers strongly agree that “Facing History’s presence in our school has helped my students “think more carefully about the consequences of their choices.” They reported that their students are now “more likely to come to the aid of other people, even people who are not close friends and family,” and that they are more ready to “Stand up for what they believe in, even when others disagree.” In our most recent evaluation study (Barr, 2012), we looked at how well we have promoted students’ informed civic engagement grounded in Jewish values and 72% of the educators feel the presence of Facing History in their schools has increased the extent to which students have explored their Jewish identity and 66% feel Facing history has helped students make the connections between their lives and Jewish texts and lessons, including the constant theme throughout our work of Tikkun olam.
Students also believe that they have grown in their thinking about many critical issues. After a Martin Luther King Day program that addressed issues of religion and civil and human rights, one student commented, “The government can legislate religious freedom, but people are responsible for religious tolerance.”
Asked how the program had changed their thinking, one student responded, “I learned that being an upstander is so important because if you don’t take action and stand up for what is right, it might never be fixed. Standing by and watching bad things happen is as bad as actually doing the bad thing. Facing History has also taught me that we shouldn’t judge others by their race, color of skin, ethnicity, religion, …. but we should judge people on what kind of person they are and how they treat others.”
Students have also observed changes in their peers. One student reported, “I have seen that people who are usually excluded are now being included.” Another commented, “All the students in my grade are more cautious about what they say in regards to racism.”
Students appear to have learned lessons they can apply to their everyday lives beyond the classroom. Reflecting on the challenge of resisting peer pressure when it conflicts with what one believes is essentially right, one student observed, “Even if you disagree with what’s going on around you it’s not enough, you have to stand up for your rights and beliefs, and that we can be manipulated by the lure of acceptance but it’s worth nothing if we hurt another human being.”
Facing History now lives in the nooks and crannies of every participating school – history and language arts, Talmud and Hebrew language, art, Town Hall meetings, and whole school parent/student events. Vocabulary such as “Bystanders,” “Upstanders,” and “Universe of Obligation” are shared among faculty and students across the schools. Students’ comments have affirmed that the program has fostered Jewish values and advanced social justice in their classes, schools, communities and the larger world, engaging them in the essence of Tikkun olam in action. Finally, an important, and perhaps unexpected, by-product of the project has been the communication and collaboration among the teachers, not just across disciplines in the schools but across religious denomination, as well. At every seminar, regional meetings and virtual retreats, educators from across the day school spectrum- from yeshivas to pluralistic day schools- learned, discussed, and argued with each other. In today’s world of polarization in the Jewish community, this Klal Israel experience is a significant contribution to Tikkun olam.