Staff POV
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After its first trip focused on addressing climate change, how Emerging Leaders is preparing students to become human rights activists
Tags Share When 12 students from Bangor, Maine, arrived in Washington, D.C. for Speak Truth to Power’s Emerging Leaders trip on April 16, they arrived ready to engage. The Emerging Leaders Trip is an opportunity for students from our partner schools to connect with a human rights issue. This year’s was centered around environmental justice…
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RFK: Personal Anecdotes 55 Years on
Tags Share May 1968 was Robert F. Kennedy’s last full month of campaigning for president before he was killed in June. While he is remembered more broadly for his vision of a more just and peaceful world, it is, perhaps, the anecdotes that best illustrate his character and a place to draw inspiration. Kevin Khadavi…
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Human Rights Education inspiration Prejean talks social justice, activism, on her 84th Birthday
Tags Share On her 84th birthday, Sister Helen Prejean showed few, if any, signs of slowing down. Prejean – the subject of a Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights Speak Truth to Power lesson plan that has reached roughly 5 million students since 2000 – is the nun who wrote the best-selling book Dead Man Walking…
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A call to strengthen protect mechanisms for environmental defenders on International Earth Day
Tags Share Being an environmental human rights defender is one of the most dangerous jobs in the world. Every day, government authorities, companies and other non-state actors seek to silence environmental defenders on the frontlines of the global climate and environmental movement through unwarranted persecution, harassment, detention and even murder. As we commemorate International Earth…
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Student Voices Engaged for Equity
Tags Share While the longstanding impacts of racism permeate our society, discussions of race are largely absent from much of the public school curriculum and have become contentious in today’s educational environment. It’s left many educators searching for strategies to start constructive and open dialogue about race in the classroom. On March 10, we hosted…
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How The Piney Woods School Honors Local Human Rights Defenders
Tags Share “They damaged my leg. I said they damaged my leg. But I still walked in my purpose.” As she raised her voice to emphasize her point, Takira Adams, a freshman at The Piney Woods School, fully and powerfully embodied the spirit of human rights defender Fannie Lou Hamer, a leader in the Civil…
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Learning about human rights and effecting change through theater
Tags Share Their stories were familiar. Their anger and frustration were palpable. “She never made contact again.” “There were men outside our house with guns, and I did not know whether they were to protect us or hurt us.” “That is where the earth ate her.” In a hotel meeting room in Toreón, Mexico, 20…
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Fannie Lou Hamer: An Activist for Civil Rights and Women’s Rights
Tags Share Fannie Lou Hamer, born in 1917, was the 20th child of two Mississippi sharecroppers. Hamer was just 6 when she began working in the plantation fields with her family; she dropped out of school at 12 to work full-time. After marrying Perry “Pap” Hammer in the early 1940s, she went for what she…
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For Western Sahara, freedom has been an empty promise
Tags Share Last week, the United Nations Human Rights Council adopted recommendations of its Universal Periodic Review on Morocco. A major highlight of the process was Morocco’s abuse of human rights in Western Sahara — a country on the northwest coast of Africa that it has illegally occupied since 1975. The international community has consistently…
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From Rapid Defense Network to RFKHR: Sarah Gillman’s Fight for Justice
Tags Share On the evening of September 25, 2019, Sarah Gillman stood on Flatbush Avenue in Brooklyn, New York. She had been calling the United States District Court all evening to try to present an emergency request for a stay of deportation to a judge on an emergency basis. Gillman finally was able to speak…
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How Women Shaped the Universal Declaration of Human Rights
Tags Share The Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) is widely regarded as a landmark document of the 20th century. It is the most translated document in the world and has been ratified by every country. Over the past 75 years, the UDHR has served as a blueprint for human rights and inspired several international…
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Ursula Burns: ‘Diversity is one of the things I care most about’
Tags Share A more diverse business world is, at last, beginning to emerge. But to appreciate the progress and ensure it continues, it’s important to look to the past, Integrum Holdings Partner Ursula Burns says. The former Xerox CEO discussed how businesses could work toward a more just and equitable vision for women and people…
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