Every Teacher Deserves This Support

Facing History’s has inspired change in me and my students through our community of learning. I would like to share a snapshot of some of my own experiences with Facing History, along with those of three of my former students: Emily, Dalton, and Liam.

I hope through my words that you can see how Facing History directly fills urgent needs in our society. A need to create educational spaces where students belong. A need to empower students through the study of history to choose to stand up to bigotry and hatred.

The first student I want to tell you about is Emily, an outgoing theater student; I learned a great deal from her. Emily was moved by the intentional focus on emotional engagement in my class, and she coined the class phrase, “That hit me in the heart today.” She would say it often, and her peers and I soon followed. I borrowed the line when my students needed time to process emotional challenges: “If this hits you in the heart, feel free to journal about it or stay after class to process it,” I’d say. 

Years after Emily took my class, she reached out. In her college historiography class she was learning about how bias can influence writers of history. She chose to write a paper for that class about a unique approach to history that she learned in a Facing History class. The approach she detailed explained how Facing History’s lessons show how history is made up of a series of individual choices; it’s a type of study where a deep dive into the actions of Hitler and the Nazis opens students’ eyes to the importance of civic engagement so that such atrocities would never happen again.

The second student I want to tell you about is Dalton. I witnessed a transformation in him as he studied history through the Facing History lens. Throughout my Holocaust and Human Behavior class, Dalton seemed incredibly disengaged and I was unsure about his interest level. When we reached the unit focused on exploring the Holocaust, I began to notice shifts in Dalton. We watched Helen K’s survivor testimony about her participation in the resistance at Auschwitz, the tragic hanging of three young women with whom she had resisted, and her experience of being a stateless refugee following her liberation. We were confronting these topics at the height of the Syrian refugee crisis, and the very next day after hearing Helen K.’s testimony, we read Warsan Shire’s vivid and heart-wrenching poem about the refugee experience called “Home.” Little did I know how these two pieces would linger in Dalton’s mind.

About six weeks later, Dalton spoke up for the first time as he presented his end-of-year project. His presentation included a passport inside of a broken picture frame. In the most vulnerable and honest way, he shared the meaning of what he had created. Dalton explained that before taking our class, he had never even thought of immigrants or refugees as real and individual people. He explained, “Seeing Helen as a refugee and then hearing the refugee experience in the poem ‘Home’ makes me think totally differently about the refugee crisis we’re facing today.” That day Dalton’s peers gave him a standing ovation. Facing History helped Dalton bring history into our present world in a way that changed him. Dalton’s experience is yet another example of the community of belonging available for Facing History students and teachers; this is a community that pushes us to reflect upon our choices and empowers us to embrace positive change in ourselves and our society.

The final student I want to tell you about is Liam. Liam, the type of extrovert who always showed up early and stayed late just to get in some extra talking time about current events—you know the type! His enthusiasm for my Facing History class was contagious as he would exclaim to other students, “This is the best class ever!” His energy often energized me.

I heard from Liam again right after the United States capital insurrection in January of 2021. He was struggling and said he wished he could be in our Facing History class to process the events in a safe space. While I was thrilled to hear how much the class had meant to him, I was also saddened to realize that as an adult he didn’t have a place to engage in civil dialogue about troubling events. Liam’s experience reminds me how necessary it is to expand the reach of Facing History. We must continue encouraging students to engage in this divided world. With the skills we’ve equipped them with, students can create their own havens of civil discourse, hope, and healing within their communities.

Facing History & Ourselves is a community of belonging. I feel people cheering me on and supporting me in tangible ways with the best curriculum resources and professional development available in the educational world today. Every teacher deserves the community of support I have received from Facing History. Every student deserves the community of belonging Emily, Dalton, and Liam found in my classes. It’s through Facing History that educators like me can equip students to create inspiring change in our world.