Speak Truth to Power

A part of my role at Chab Dai is to assist in the development of a  ‘What is Human Trafficking’ curriculum. This is being designed as a resource for facilitators to use when addressing community meetings and forums with an audience seeking answers on trafficking. It’s a bit of a tricky process, as I’m working with content from my director who has facilitated a number of these forums across the United States – and I need to figure out the best way to ‘package’ the information into one document.

This is really testing my ‘Pages’ knowledge. Thank goodness I had some practise throughout uni and on my professional folio (and yes Lucy, I will try my best to make sure the entire curriculum is written in Century Gothic).

I’m regularly distracted by the task as I begin to explore ‘What is Human Trafficking’ from all the resources I have available at work. One of my favourites so far is called ‘Speak Truth to Power’. 

I’ve fallen in love with the curriculum created by the Robert F. Kennedy Center for Justice and Human Rights.

It began as a book written by Kerry Kennedy and has since been translated into  6 languages, adapted into a dramatic production (Speak Truth to Power: Voices From Beyond the Dark by Ariel Dorfman, with a premiere cast including Sigourney Weaver, John Malkovich and Alex Baldwin), displayed as a photographic portrait exhibition in four continents, AND developed into (my favourite) human rights curriculum.

The curriculum covers stories and the journeys of remarkable people working in the field across the globe, and encourages students to become personally involved in the protection of human rights. 

'Speak Truth to Power: Voices From Beyond the Dark' cast

As a teacher – I love this. The curriculum itself is broken down into topics such as Genocide, Slavery, Trafficking, Forced/Child Labour, Poverty and Free Expression of Religion and Beliefs. It guides teachers and students through a personal account and then provides study notes allowing students to go deeper. It states class objectives, student skills, learning areas, concepts covered, technology requirements, additional resources, vocabulary, differentiation instructions, student activities – all the beautiful sub headings that make a teacher’s heart skip a beat! It’s a cut/paste job when it comes to unit planners – and who doesn’t love that? It’s aimed at high-school classes but certain chapters can certainly be adapted to upper primary classes too.

I’ve only been out of my teaching contract back home a few months – but reading a curriculum like this gives me the itch to get home and back in the classroom!

Seriously – for my teaching friends (and those of you interested in reading the stories of truly inspiring people) – please consider integrating this curriculum into your planner for Term 2 – and well done for surviving the first term of 2013!

‘The Speak Truth to Power lessons were designed by New York state teachers and brings to the classroom the passion of those who risk their lives for human rights. Their compelling stories are made real to students through a rich curriculum…that challenges students to think about how they can become defenders of human rights locally and how their actions will be felt globally. I invited you to integrate these materials into your classroom curriculum. All the lessons are available online at www.nysut.org and at www.rfkcenter.org

Thank you for moving forward the advocacy of these defenders.’

Richard Iannuzzi (President, New York State United Teachers).