Relevant education:
ABRAHAM'S VISION Graduation Day! film
Thursday, 14 October 2010
Too many young
people are being taught to give up their dreams
before they have
any experience attempting to pursue them.
-- Robert Fritz
"Education is
simply the soul of a society
as it passes from
one generation to another."
-- Gilbert K.
Chesterton (1874-1936)
"Education is
the transmission of civilization."
-- Will Durant
(1885-1981)
On some campuses worldwide, alienated students of diverse cultures are stuck
in their "campus wars" without mentors or tools to successfully
communicate with the "other".
Uncivilized, unprepared, and languishing, young women
and men await educators who teach not only "about" conflict
transformation but provide experiences "of" mature engagement -- relevant
education.
Successful engagement, communication, and learning
together is here.
Now irrelevant is the conversation about
"some day" and "waiting for the future."
See two inspiring examples of modern educators
and students -- heroes of relevant education.
Transmitting civilization.
-
L&L
RELEVANT EDUCATION
East Jerusalem, Tel-Aviv, Oberlin
college students
This 2010 year, a group of Palestinian, Israeli, and U.S. university
professors and students are cooperating.
In Spring, with a common source book and
common syllabus, their students studied American democracy -- it's strengths, weaknesses, and future challenges.
Online discussion forums, as well as Skype and
video-conferencing, produced excellent communication and common
ground between students at the different schools.
The professors and students created meaningful
education despite surrounding challenges -- public pessimism, violence,
boycotts, perpetual political failures.
The exemplary professors are:
Mohammed S. Dajani Daoudi, Founder and Director of the
American Studies Institute
Al-Quds
University
mohddajani@americanstudiespalestine.org
and mohddajani@hotmail.com
Michael Zakim, Professor of History
Tel Aviv University
Zakim@post.tau.ac.il
Carol Lasser
and Gary Kornblith, Professors of History (and married)
Oberlin College
Carol.Lasser@oberlin.edu and
Gary.Kornblith@oberlin.edu
During summer, 40 of the Palestinian, Israeli, and U.S. students finally met
face to face at Oberlin College in Ohio to further explore their multi-cultural
future and learn together.
READ more:
Palestinian
and Israeli students share cultural exchange
at
Oberlin in American Democracy seminar
Oberlin News - 23 July 2010
http://new.oberlin.edu/home/news-media/detail.dot?id=2295629
By bridging Jewish and Arab cultures,
a
pair of Oberlin historians hope to shape history
The Plain Dealer - Thursday,
05 August 2010
http://blog.cleveland.com/metro/2010/08/by_bridging_jewish_and_arab_cu.html
RELEVANT EDUCATION
California
high school students
ABRAHAM'S VISION Graduation Day! is a new October 2010 film.
On Sunday June 13, 2010, The University of San
Francisco hosted Muslim and Jewish high school students graduating from the
year-long Unity Program of Abraham's Vision.
These 39 courageous teens had successfully
learned together about Muslims, Jews, Islam, and Judaism, while
strengthening relationships among themselves and with their own communities and
religious traditions.
In the Unity Program -- http://www.abrahamsvision.org/unity-program/unity-program/course-summary.html
-- they also awakened to an expanded understanding of the
Palestinian-Israeli relationship.
This hard-earned celebration in San Francisco gave
voice to their dedicated faculty and to the students themselves whose lives
changed by learning together.
Graduation Day opened with the co-directors
-- a Jew and a Muslim -- introducing. . .one another.
VIEW the film online:
ABRAHAM'S
VISION Graduation Day!
Muslim &
Jewish youth learning together - 2010
40 min documentary video
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These and hundreds of other success stories are preserved at http://traubman.igc.org/messages.htm