Civic Learning Week National Forum 

Tuesday, March 12, 2024 | George Washington University and National Archives, Washington D.C.

2024 and Beyond: Civic Learning as a Unifying Force

Register to Attend    Register to Watch

U.S. Supreme Court Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Amy Coney Barrett will join the Civic Learning Week National Forum on March 12, 2024, livestreamed from Washington, D.C. Showcasing the Justices’ shared commitment to high-quality civic education, the featured conversation will be moderated by Eric Liu, co-founder and CEO of Citizen University, and address student questions about the judicial system and civic engagement, as well as the Justices’ legal career paths. The discussion will highlight the civic knowledge, skills, and dispositions gained through civic education, and why civics is essential to sustaining and strengthening constitutional democracy in the United States.

The forum will also include panel discussions and research presentations on Information Literacy, Bridging the Divide, and Elections as a Teachable Moment, concluding with a Fireside Chat between Archivist of the United States Colleen Shogan and Secretary of Education Dr. Miguel Cardona (tentative). View full schedule and ticketing options.

HRE USA will be present at the 2024 IAHRE Conference: Extending Human Rights Education


We’re pleased to announce that HRE USA will be presenting at the 2024 IAHRE Conference: Extending Human Rights Education in London, April 19, 2024!

The HRE USA Podcast Team’s poster session is titled, “Human Rights Education Now! Podcast: Building a Space for Critical Human Rights Education Discussions in the U.S.”

HRE USA has become a member of this global network, our members are encouraged to attend!

>> IAHRE conference information and registration
>> IAHRE website

Civic Learning Week National Forum 

Tuesday, March 12, 2024 | George Washington University and National Archives, Washington D.C.

2024 and Beyond: Civic Learning as a Unifying Force

Register to Attend    Register to Watch

U.S. Supreme Court Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Amy Coney Barrett will join the Civic Learning Week National Forum on March 12, 2024, livestreamed from Washington, D.C. Showcasing the Justices’ shared commitment to high-quality civic education, the featured conversation will be moderated by Eric Liu, co-founder and CEO of Citizen University, and address student questions about the judicial system and civic engagement, as well as the Justices’ legal career paths. The discussion will highlight the civic knowledge, skills, and dispositions gained through civic education, and why civics is essential to sustaining and strengthening constitutional democracy in the United States.

The forum will also include panel discussions and research presentations on Information Literacy, Bridging the Divide, and Elections as a Teachable Moment, concluding with a Fireside Chat between Archivist of the United States Colleen Shogan and Secretary of Education Dr. Miguel Cardona (tentative). View full schedule and ticketing options.

Zinn Education Project: Everyday Solidarity: Interracial Organizing Stories from The Sum of Us

On Monday, February 5, 2024, policy advocate Heather McGhee will discuss The Sum of Us: How Racism Hurts Everyone, the young readers’ edition of her bestselling book and the podcast companion series.

Heather McGhee is distinguished lecturer of urban studies at CUNY School of Labor and Urban Studies. In addition to testifying before Congress, drafting legislation, and developing strategies for organizations and campaigns, McGhee is chair of the board of Color of Change.

McGhee will be in conversation with Jesse Hagopian and Cierra Kaler-Jones. Jesse teaches Ethnic Studies and is the co-adviser to the Black Student Union at Garfield High School in Seattle. He is an editor for Rethinking Schools, the co-editor of Teaching for Black Lives, editor of More Than a Score: The New Uprising Against High-Stakes Testing, and on the leadership team of the Zinn Education Project. Cierra serves as the executive director of Rethinking Schools. Cierra is also on the leadership team of the Zinn Education Project, and is a teacher, a dancer, a writer, and a researcher. She previously served as director of storytelling at the Communities for Just Schools Fund.

Monday, February 5, 2024 at 4pm (PT)/7pm (ET), virtual

>> Learn more and register

Human Rights 75 – Youth Dialogue | UN Web TV

Human Rights 75 Youth Dialogue: Amplifying the HR75 initiative among young people

More information here!

The Youth Dialogue organized on the margins of the Human Rights 75 High-level event is aimed to ensure that young people play an active role in the HR75 initiative and in shaping human rights commitments for the future.

The event will allow young people to express their concerns and expectations about the future of human rights and share their vision of what States, the UN and young people should do to strengthen human rights in the coming years.

The Youth Dialogue will involve the discussion of the Human Rights 75 Youth Declaration, the presentation of the Youth Rights Advocacy Toolkit, and the launch of the OHCHR documentary “Changemakers: Stories of young human rights educators”.

Dignity, Freedom & Justice for All: A Human Rights Concert 

Co-hosted by Amnesty International Nashville and Human Rights Educators USA

November 30, 2023, 8-10 pm

Location: Omni Nashville Hotel (Legends Ballroom E)

Please join us for an evening of music and celebration with inspiring Nashville musicians!  Together, we will honor the 75th Anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the many educators, artists, and activists working to promote and protect human rights and the right to education.

Training as Action Series (TAAS): Protest and Beyond: Powerful Ways to Promote Your Message

Human Rights Educators USA’s annual Training as Action Series (TAAS) is a virtual training series focused on bridging personal and collective action on some of the most critical human rights issues of today. TAAS creates an educational space to connect and collaborate with others in human rights education and training. It also gives participants the skills and information needed to take action on rights issues in their communities. The 2023-2024 training series will celebrate the 75th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) and center on the theme, “Protecting Democracy, Promoting Human Rights.” Sessions will discuss topics such as voting rights, facilitating difficult conversations, organizing an advocacy campaign, communicating with decision makers, protesting, and mental wellness.

Summary
This module is designed so that participants can better understand the purpose and importance of protest, symbolic action, and creative means in promoting a human rights message while developing the necessary knowledge and skills to participate in and organize these actions.

Objectives

  • Discuss the importance of the right to protest and freedom of expression to human rights and democracy
  • Identify the purpose(s) of protest and symbolic action
  • Understand how to safely attend a protest
  • Examine how to organize a protest
  • Explore other ways to make a statement such as through art, music, poetry, demonstration, and performance

TAAS Sessions:

  • Protest and Beyond: Powerful Ways to Promote Your Message (Thursday, November 9th, 7-9 pm ET)
  • Finding Joy: Integrating Mental Wellness into Your Advocacy Strategies (Thursday, November 16th, 7-9 pm ET)

>> Learn more

>> Register

International Association for Human Rights Education: 2024 Conference and  Call for papers

Extending human rights education  

Friday 19 April 2024

9.30 – 17.00 

 Venue: IOE UCL’s Faculty of Education and Society 20 Bedford Way, London WC1H 0AL, UK 

 Background 

The International Association for Human Rights Education (IAHRE) was established in June 2023 at the 15th International Conference for Education and Democratic Citizenship (ICEDC) held at University College Dublin. Its goal is to support the development of human rights education research, scholarship and practice internationally. IAHRE has its own scholarly journal, the award-winning Human Rights Education Review, founded in 2018.   

The ICEDC annual conference was set up as a meeting place for scholars, researchers, graduate students, education policymakers, and civil society activists from across Europe and internationally. Since 2019, it has been complemented by the WERA International Research Network on Human Rights Education, coordinated by Professors Audrey Osler and Hugh Starkey which in collaboration with Human Rights Education Review has run an international webinar series. The IAHRE International Conference aims to build on this experience, providing all with a unique opportunity to present and discuss current research and policy relating to human rights education and to questions of human rights within education.  

Keynote speakers  

Our two keynote speakers are:  

Professor Sonia Livingstone Department of Media and Communications, LSE, whose research focuses on children’s rights in the digital age 

Professor Farzana Shain Geroge Wood Professor, Goldsmiths, University of London whose interests include educational inequalities, education policy, politics and human rights.   

Call for papers 

We invite scholars to submit papers to this first IAHRE International Conference Extending human rights educationWe welcome contributions that review and critically reflect on human rights education, child rights education and the wider area of education and human rights from a range of perspectives, including sociology, education, law, history, politics, geography and other relevant disciplines. Papers concerned with analyses of policy and case studies of campaigns are likewise invited. We welcome contributions from researchers at all stages of their careers.  

While we invite research addressing education at all levels, we are conscious that in most societies children and young people struggle to make their voices heard since they are excluded from formal political mechanisms and frequently regarded as lacking the competence to contribute to decision-making processes. Young people also face a world of political and social uncertainties in which information sources are not always reliable. Climate change, terrorism, conflict, hate speech and xenophobia confront them in the starkest terms. Intergenerational justice is the aim of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Sustainable development includes ‘sustainable lifestyles, human rights, gender equality, promotion of a culture of peace and non-violence, global citizenship and appreciation of cultural diversity and of culture’s contribution to sustainable development’ (SDG 4). Our conference will consider how education policy and practice and education professionals, including teachers. can respond to these challenges. 

The following are indicative themes: 

  • Children’s digital worlds, intergenerational justice and human rights   
  • Human rights education and curriculum development  
  • Critical approaches to global citizenship education 
  • Migration, citizenship and rights education  
  • Teacher education and human rights  
  • Human rights education and language learning 
  • Worldviews education and human rights 
  • History education, decolonisation and human rights    

Abstracts of no more than 300 words including name, institutional affiliation and contact email should be sent, no later than Thursday 7 December 2023 to: Professor Hugh Starkey h.starkey@ucl.ac.uk. All abstracts will be peer reviewed by members of the IAHRE Conference Steering Group. Please indicate whether you would prefer to give an oral or a poster presentation. Applicants will be informed of the outcome of the review by Wednesday 20 December 2023. Selected papers will be considered for publication in our peer-reviewed journal Human Rights Education Review.

Registration will open in January 2024. IAHRE members are eligible for a discount. Membership categories are as follows:  

Ordinary annual member: £50 

Supporting annual member: £100+ 

Life membership: £800 

Institutional annual membership: £250 (with membership benefits for up to 6 named individuals)    

Conference registration fees (to include conference pack, lunch and all refreshments)

Early bird fees will apply to all bookings made by 4 March 2024.  

Early bird (member): £195 

Early bird (non-member): £210 

Standard (member): £220 

Standard (non-member) £230     

Training as Action Series (TAAS): Communicating with Decision Makers: How to Contact Influential Figures

Human Rights Educators USA’s annual Training as Action Series (TAAS) is a virtual training series focused on bridging personal and collective action on some of the most critical human rights issues of today. TAAS creates an educational space to connect and collaborate with others in human rights education and training. It also gives participants the skills and information needed to take action on rights issues in their communities. The 2023-2024 training series will celebrate the 75th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) and center on the theme, “Protecting Democracy, Promoting Human Rights.” Sessions will discuss topics such as voting rights, facilitating difficult conversations, organizing an advocacy campaign, communicating with decision makers, protesting, and mental wellness.

Summary
Communicating with decision makers such as elected officials is key to enacting change. This module will explore the different ways to contact those in positions of power and equip participants with the skills needed to do so effectively.

Objectives

  • Identify the role of communicating with decision makers in a democracy and its importance for protecting rights
  • Discuss the primary ways to contact decision makers: letters/emails, phone calls, and meetings
  • Develop the knowledge and skills needed to communicate with decision makers
  • Explore how to use collective action when contacting decision makers, such as through letter writing campaigns, and how these actions can be incorporated into a classroom/educational environment
  • Role play advocacy meetings and the Dos and Don’ts of an advocacy meeting

TAAS Sessions:

  • Communicating with Decision Makers: How to Contact Influential Figures (Thursday, November 2nd, 7-9 pm ET)
  • Protest and Beyond: Powerful Ways to Promote Your Message(Thursday, November 9th, 7-9 pm ET)
  • Finding Joy: Integrating Mental Wellness into Your Advocacy Strategies (Thursday, November 16th, 7-9 pm ET)

>> Learn more

>> Register