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Red Cross Educates Teachers on Humanitarian Law
Written by
Lesly C. Simmons
, Staff Writer, RedCross.org
Friday, December 02, 2005 — People are often surprised to learn that even with all of its destruction, wars are bound by rules. As the public becomes more aware of the hundreds of armed conflicts happening around the world at any time thanks to television and the internet, understanding the rules that apply can give a unique understanding of those conflicts.
To increase awareness of the “rules of war,” the American Red Cross is working with teachers in the United States to educate young students about the need for humanity even in the midst of war.
In 2001, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) developed the Exploring Humanitarian Law (EHL) curriculum in cooperation with the Educational Development Center, to educate students about dignity and responsibility during armed conflicts.
South African teachers met for a week to learn the Red Cross curriculum on humanitarian law. |
Since 2003 the Red Cross has reached nearly 200 teachers with the curriculum through trainings, workshops, and conferences. A majority of those teachers are now using the program in their own classrooms, according to Alicia Guajardo with the EHL program.
“We have a small cadre of current teachers that were turned into trainers because we learned the best way to promote the program with teachers is to have others talk about their experience with it in the classroom,” said Guajardo.
Teacher Amanda Erickson was one of those who worked on the team of scholars that aligned the program with American social studies education standards. Erickson teaches American history to sophomores and psychology and sociology to juniors and seniors at New Richmond High School in New Richmond, WI. She added the program to her courses and saw an immediate positive response in her students.
“I found right away it resonated, especially with the lowest 10 percent of the kids” who are often hardest to reach. Erickson said. “They loved it! I think what the kids liked the best was saying International Humanitarian Law. It sounds very important.”
Erickson’s class does things like “Spot the Violation,” where students get extra credit if they report something from the news that could violate humanitarian law.
American teachers Erickson and Frankmann visited South African shanty towns like this to get a true sense of conditions in those communities. |
“For a sophomore in high school, their world is very small, so if they can see something outside of their world that they understand it brings relevance, and that is the first part of education,” she said.”
In 2005 Erickson and Paul Frankmann, a world history teacher for freshman at Aurora High School in Aurora, Ohio, were invited by the ICRC and American Red Cross to travel to Cape Town, South Africa, where they spent a week sharing the curriculum with teachers from townships around the region.
These teachers were feeling in many ways at the end of their ropes, according to Erickson. Corporal punishment had been outlawed for students two years before, and many of the children were orphans, having lost their parents to the HIV/AIDS epidemic, or the widespread violence South African has known over the years. The desperate conditions create serious disciplinary problems and other issues in the classroom.
The South African teachers gave up their winter break to attend the week long training session conducted by Erickson and Frankmann.
“These teachers were working at the schools in the shanty towns,” said Erickson. “They were dealing with things we could never even imagine, and many of them felt like the students were just taking over, and there was no way for them to get the classrooms back under control.
Fellow instructor Frankmann said that the courses became a way to empower the teachers to reach their students.
“The program administrators did not give us a lot of guidelines,” he said. “They just wanted us to arm teachers to inspire hope in their kids. This gave them a sense of dignity, and we were able to help them see that it could be very valuable for their kids.”
Some of the case studies used in the EHL curriculum came out of South Africa’s history of apartheid and the mistreatment that resulted, so participants were able to draw from their personal experiences and histories. It became a life changing experience for both the American instructors and the South African counterparts they were teaching.
“All the lessons take on a new meaning now that I’ve gone to South Africa,” said Frankmann. “In my teaching this year I am able to include so many real world examples from that experience, and I think it did a lot for the South African teachers as well. They all seemed to think that education was the key to the future, and this became a new and exciting way for them to approach that.”
The American Red Cross implemented EHL as part of its International Humanitarian Law Dissemination Program. In collaboration with the University of Wisconsin, River Falls, a team of professors and high school teachers aligned the curriculum with standards set by the U.S. National Council for Social Studies. As of June 2005 there were 98 countries involved in some phase of implementation of EHL.
For more information on EHL, please contact the Red Cross via email at EHL@usa.redcross.org.
As part of the world's largest humanitarian network, the American Red Cross alleviates the suffering of victims of war, disaster and other international crises, and works with other Red Cross and Red Crescent societies to improve chronic, life-threatening conditions in developing nations. We reconnect families separated by emergencies and educate the American public about international humanitarian law. This assistance is made possible through the generosity of the American public.
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