By Melissa Garlick | National Civil Rights Counsel May 22, 2018 Harvard Law & Policy Review Three militia members from southwest Kansas were recently convicted on federal civil rights charges and conspiring to use a weapon of mass destruction for targeting Somali Muslim immigrants for a plan of mass murder in 2016. On a recording made available to the jury, one of the defendants said: “The only good Muslim is a dead Muslim.” The convictions sent an important message of…
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Washington, D.C., May 11, 2018 ... In testimony before the US Commission on Civil Rights today, the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) outlined the urgent need to improve hate crime prevention, training, and response, highlighting a series of specific recommendations to improve hate crime reporting and advance police-community relations. The ADL statement, which was presented by Melissa Garlick, ADL National Civil Rights Counsel, also discussed the current climate of incivility and…
Table Talk: Family Conversations about Current Events For Parents, Families, and Caregivers Topic SummaryIn 1983, a social scientist named David Chambers published a research study on children’s drawings. The study gathered information from the late 1960s and 1970s in which teachers asked 5,000 children (in three different countries) to “draw a scientist.” One pattern appeared strongly: almost all of the scientist drawings depicted men. Through the study, Chambers was able to…
by: Lorraine Array April 09, 2018
Holocaust Remembrance Day is commemorated each year a week after the end of the Passover holiday, a day when the world pauses to remember the Holocaust, the millions who died and those who lived on, many to tell their stories to a generation born more than half a century later. To the younger among us, the Holocaust can feel like ancient history. Why is it important that we remember? And why do we continue to utter the mandate of Never…
For Educators When teaching about historical atrocities, educators seek to build empathy through interactive lessons. What seems like a false solution is turning to simulation activities. These exercises frequently backfire, causing real harm to students, families and school communities. The Problem:News stories regularly surface about classroom simulations gone wrong: students assigned roles as "persecuted" or "privileged" to understand the Holocaust, or asked to experience what it "felt like…
March 12, 2018 Since the mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas HS in Parkland, Florida, students have been engaging in a variety of actions to force change on gun control, including preparations for nationwide student walkouts on March 14 and April 20.
Teachable Moments
Whether you personally support these walkouts or not, as a teacher or school administrator they are an opportunity to elevate student voice and action as powerful teachable moments. These can include conversations…
February 28, 2018 This post originally appeared on the Leadership 360 blog in Education Week on February 22, 2018.
Last week at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, seventeen students and adults were murdered in a mass shooting. What happened next was unusual. Instead of waiting for adults to act, students took the lead.
They are giving fiery speeches, demanding their turn to enact change. Emma Gonzalez, a senior at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School,…
by: Jonathan Greenblatt | February 05, 2018 USA Today The cold-blooded murder of Blaze Bernstein has horrified the Jewish community and indeed all Americans. It is hard to come to terms with the shocking brutality that ended the life of such a bright and promising young man. At just 19, Blaze already had shown an aptitude for writing and the arts, even while excelling in a rigorous molecular sciences program at the University of Pennsylvania.
Blaze will always be remembered for the…
January 25, 2018 In July 2017, after seven days of statements and testimony from more than 150 sexual abuse survivors, Larry Nassar, the former team doctor for the U.S. gymnastics team, was sentenced to 40 to 175 years in prison. From the women's testimony, here's what we learned: Many of the accusers were minors, as young as six years old, at the time of the assaults. Most of the women were gymnasts but they also included dancers, rowers and runners. Some of those who shared their experiences…
January 17, 2018 Updated: July 16, 2019 It has become commonplace to witness a public display of bigoted and offensive language. In a tweet, President Trump remarked that four U.S. Congresswomen of color (Ocasio-Cortez, Omar, Pressley and Tlaib) should “go back and help fix the totally broken and crime infested places from which they came.” The language of "go back to where you came from" is widely recognized as a racist slur, and in particular this one is also…
December 07, 2017 Updated: December 18, 2017 Editor's Note: Christian Picciolini and ADL's work battling extremism was featured on Sunday, Dec. 17 on 60 Minutes on CBS. As the one-time leader of one of the most infamous white supremacist groups in America, Christian Picciolini was once so immersed in the hate movement that his name appeared prominently in an ADL report on neo-Nazi activity in Illinois. Picciolini had swastika and racist tattoos on his arms and led a small empire…
For parents, families and young people Topic SummaryIn recent years, there has been a lot of attention paid to the diversity of children’s books, shining a light on the lack of diversity and amplifying the need for more children’s and young adult literature that reflects our multicultural society. In 2014, an organization named We Need Diverse Books formed, following a regularly trending hashtag with the same name (#WeNeedDiverseBooks) that helped bring attention to the issue. We…
Teach students about the importance of diverse literature and engage them in a study on the diversity of books in their classroom or school library.
Talk to your family about issues of sexual harassment in the news in the past and currently.
October 03, 2017 In August 2016, then-NFL San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick decided to take a stand about racial injustice by refusing to stand for the National Anthem at football games. He spent much of the season either sitting or kneeling during the anthem. Fast forward to the 2017 football season where the controversy emerged again when on a Sunday in September, more than 200 NFL players took a knee during the Anthem.
This recent controversy over NFL players and…
August 29, 2017 Adults and children alike are grappling to make sense of current events. Discussions of racism, anti-Semitism and social injustice have become increasingly contentious as images of white supremacists carrying torches and chanting hateful rhetoric in Charlottesville fill our social media feeds and television screens. Children are attuned to these conversations and disturbing images of violence, hate and incivility, and are seeking comfort and answers from teachers, family…
August 29, 2017 In response to the recent events in Charlottesville, Facing History and Ourselves, Teaching Tolerance, the Anti-Defamation League, the American Federation of Teachers, and EduColor teamed up to support educators as they return to the classroom. Hosted and led by AFT, we asked educators what topics they were most concerned about and addressed them in a co-hosted webinar, “When Hate Is in the Headlines: Resources for K–12 Educators.” Together, we offered…
August 13, 2017 Racial hatred, bias and white supremacy were on full display in Charlottesville, Virginia this weekend.
In the largest and most violent gathering of white supremacists in decades, “Unite the Right” brought together white supremacist groups including the alt-right, neo-Nazis and the Ku Klux Klan. Their stated goal was to save the statue of Confederate General Robert E. Lee, because like other places in the South, there are still monuments there celebrating heroes…
Washington, DC, June 28, 2017…The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) will join with representatives of America’s leading civil rights and religious organizations on Thursday to present at the Justice Department’s Hate Crimes Subcommittee Summit, where Attorney General Jeff Sessions will address participants.
ADL’s experts will participate in workshops and roundtables and offer a series of recommendations and strategies on how to improve hate crime training, reporting,…
For Educators | For Parents, Families, and Caregivers Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, the High Holidays, are celebrated by Jewish people all over the world. The High Holidays fall on different days each year. For the specific dates each year, check our Calendar of Observances. These and other Jewish holidays fall on different days in our calendar because they follow the Jewish calendar, which has a different number of days than our calendar. The Jewish calendar is a Soli-lunar calendar. …