RETHINK First Newsletter

Dear reader, welcome to the RETHINK Project!

Have you noticed this growing tendency in Europe to think in terms of “us” and “them”?

In response to a rise in prejudices, antisemitism, racism and xenophobia, memorial institutions and democracy-building NGOs have taken a stand by designing inclusive education programmes that challenge students’ preconceptions and contribute to developing their media literacy and critical thinking skills.

Funded by the Erasmus+ programme, the RETHINK project (Remembrance Education for THINKing critically) aims to highlight the relevance of these programmes in addressing intolerance and polarisation and to facilitate their dissemination.

Gathering 6 European partners in the field of formal and informal education, RETHINK aims to:

Build a database that will offer a unique overview of effective educational practices in the field;
Select some of these practices as effective models to be adapted across contexts and countries;
Deliver an e-learning platform that will offer innovative pedagogical material based on remembrance education programmes and adapted to the classroom environment;
Create a new network for memorial institutions to foster transnational dialogue and collaboration between like-minded institutions.

Find out more about the RETHINK project online, Facebook and Twitter.

A New Tool for Inclusive Education

Are you interested in educational programmes that combat prejudice and promote tolerance and diversity?

Check out the RETHINK database, which collects effective practices in the field designed by memorial institutions and democracy-building NGOs. Workshops, guided tours, exhibitions, instructional materials, etc. are all available for you to browse!

The database is searchable – by keyword, country, target audience and more – and allows you to find the most relevant practices for your purposes easily, whether you are a teacher, educator, student, memorial staff or a member of the public interested in inclusive education.

For each programme listed on the database, you can access comprehensive information including its target population, cost and core activities, as well as details on the organisation that developed the practice. Contact information are also provided if you would like to get in touch.

Our database is a work in progress, open to like-minded organisations. You can add relevant good practices to our database anytime, simply by filling in the RETHINK survey.

Coming Soon: Call for Good Practices

One of the aims of the RETHINK project is to bridge the gap between formal and non-formal education. Focusing on Remembrance Education and more specifically on the Holocaust and other instances of mass violence, we are interested in good practices that make students reflect on the construction and consequences of prejudices.

As part of the project, we work with a team of partners and external experts who examine these educational programmes to see if and how they could be used in other contexts. This could be in another country, with another target group, or by amending its content. The eventual goal is to produce an Educators Guidebook to Remembrance Education, which includes references to and reflections on these practices.

We are now in the first phase of this process and trying out effective programmes designed by project partners in other memorial sites, with university students or in school classrooms across Europe.

For the second phase (February-July 2019), we are looking for practices from organisations, educators and teachers from outside the partnership, relevant for the learning and teaching of remembrance education topics.

We will launch an open call at the end of 2018 to collect these practices.

We will be specifically interested in methods and strategies, as transferability is a key criterion for our project. All practices will be added to the RETHINK database, and selected practices will be tried out by the expert team and included in the Guidebook.

If you would like to submit your practice, stay tuned for the open call that will be launched at the end of November!

A New Network in the Making

Join the RETHINK Network and become part of a community of people and organisations active in the field of Remembrance Education. This new international forum will facilitate transnational collaboration and foster the development of new training programmes addressing intolerance and polarisation.

RETHINK Network members will add value to their activities by sharing information, expertise and ideas, lending one another mutual support and forming partnerships for action.

Simply complete our form to be among the first members of the RETHINK network. By registering your interest, you will also subscribe to our newsletter and receive updates on the official launch for our network.

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