Facing History and Ourselves (Facing History) is a nonprofit educational organization whose mission is to engage students of diverse backgrounds in an examination of racism, prejudice, and antisemitism in order to promote the development of a more humane and informed citizenry. By studying the historical development of the Holocaust and other examples of collective violence, students make the essential connection between history and the moral choices they confront in their own lives. Founded in 1976 in Brookline, Massachusetts, Facing History has developed from an innovative course into an international organization serving communities in the United States and abroad. As the name implies, Facing History uses history to help teachers and students explore important themes and think critically about their own behavior and the effect that their actions have on the community that surrounds them.

Program Description

Through a series of professional development opportunities, teachers learn the program’s content and strategies for bringing challenging issues into their classrooms. Facing History offers:

week-long introductory institutes and one or two-day introductory workshops;
full-day and after-school workshops that focus on particular themes and resources;
individual consultations on curriculum planning and classroom concerns;
a lending library of print and audio-visual materials and access to speakers to enhance classroom instruction;
www.facinghistory.org, a content-rich website, and its online Campus, a password-protected section where teachers can share resources, exchange ideas, plan lessons, and download resource materials; and
community events that provide opportunities for adults and students to reflect on themes and issues that are relevant to the program.

Impact

Through the work of staff at the national office in Greater Boston and regional offices in Chicago, Cleveland, Los Angeles, Memphis, New York City, the San Francisco Bay Area, and Switzerland, more than 19,000 educators around the world have participated in a Facing History workshop or institute. Each year, these teachers reach an estimated 1.5 million middle and high school students with important lessons about the dangers of prejudice and the power of citizen participation.

International Program Highlights

á Annual teacher training seminar held for European educators;

á Teachers trained from countries around the world, including Armenia, Colombia, the Czech Republic, Germany, Kazakhstan, Hungary, Lithuania, South Africa, Sweden, and the United Kingdom;

á Selected Facing History materials translated for use in Hungary, the Czech Republic, Germany;

Several online forums conducted with international themes, most recently Educating for a Civil Society After Collective Violence. 630 teachers, students and community members from 27 countries discussed case studies about the role of education in healing society after collective violence in Germany, Northern Ireland, South Africa, and Rwanda.

Major National Initiatives

á Global Citizenship. Creation and dissemination of resource materials that encompass issues of global citizenship and make new connections between current events and our existing case studies of collective violence and discrimination, courage and resilience; expansion of our professional development services to more teachers around the globe.

á Technology. Investment in the use of technology and the Internet to expand our reach and program delivery capabilities; harnessing the power and potential of the Internet—not only for dissemination of the Facing History program, but also for an international exchange of ideas and perspectives among educators and students.

Pre-service Education. Infusing the content and pedagogy of the Facing History program into the preparation of future teachers, developing partnerships with schools of education and education departments at colleges and universities across the country.

á North America Project. Serving educators in the U.S. and Canada who are not geographically close to our regional offices, seeking to introduce Facing History and Ourselves to new teachers and schools; to provide follow-up services via technology to teachers who have already attended a Facing History workshop or institute; and to develop and pilot distance-learning tools for the entire organization.

Recognition

The success of the Facing History program and its impact on teachers and their students have been thoroughly analyzed and documented. Since its founding, Facing History has regularly been recognized as an effective, exemplary program by the U.S. Department of Education. In 1998, Facing History completed a study funded by the Carnegie Corporation of New York to evaluate the impact of its program on students. The study found that Facing History students showed:

increased relationship maturity;
increased student engagement;
decreased racist attitudes; and
increased interest in other ethnic groups.

Major Supporters

Facing History is supported by foundations, corporations, and individual donors. Past and present supporters include the Allstate Foundation, California Community Foundation, the Carnegie Corporation of New York, the Cleveland Foundation, the Ford Foundation, The Goldman Sachs Foundation, the Joyce Foundation, the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, the Charles H. Revson Foundation, the Righteous Persons Foundation, the Surdna Foundation, and the S. Mark Taper Foundation, among others.

Quick Facts

Staff of over 100 individuals dedicated to excellence in education;
Annual budget of $12+ million;
Annual calendar of more than 30 institutes and 40 workshops reaching 2,000+ educators;
Visitors to www.facinghistory.org from 64 countries; monthly average of 23,000 unique visitors and 1.86 million Web hits;
Partnerships with renowned authors, scholars, and speakers including Holocaust scholar Michael Berenbaum, psychologist Carol Gilligan, international jurist Richard Goldstone, Harvard Law professor Martha Minow, and journalist and author Samantha Power;
Publications, including a series of resource books: Holocaust and Human Behavior, The Jews of Poland, Race and Membership in American History: The Eugenics Movement, and Crimes Against Humanity and Civilizations: the Genocide of the Armenians; and classroom study guides to accompany award-winning films and video documentaries on Facing History themes: Schindler’s List, An American Love Story, Twilight: Los Angeles, Facing the Truth with Bill Moyers, Two Towns of Jasper, The Murder of Emmett Till, and Becoming American: The Chinese Experience.

For further information, please contact Chris Stokes, Director of Development and Public Affairs.

Tel.: (617) 735-1606 or e-mail: chris_stokes@facing.org