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October 19, 2001/Cheshvan 2, 5762, Vol. 54, No. 6
Teaching tolerance
Martin-Springer Institute, ADL team up for classroom education
BETH OLSON
Staff Writer
Alex Alvarez, director of the Martin-Springer Institute, addresses a Northern Arizona University crowd at a teach-in following the Sept. 11 attacks.
Photo courtesy of Alex Alvarez
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Doris Springer Martin kept her childhood promise to teach children about tolerance.
When she was a young girl in Poland, the Germans invaded the country and she was taken to Auschwitz - separated from her parents and four siblings.
Miraculously, not only did she survive, but her entire family was reunited after the war. Although her mother died shortly after the war ended, her father brought the family to Los Angeles, where he lived to the age of 103.
While in Los Angeles, she met Ralph Martin, who was working in the aerospace industry. They married and moved to Flagstaff in the 1970s.
Doris Martin says that because God allowed her and her family to survive the Holocaust, she made a promise to herself to educate children against hate and to "teach the kids to have tolerance and peace in the world."
Since then, Doris Martin has devoted her time to teaching about the Holocaust in schools and subsequently decided she wanted to broaden her scope of influence. Last year Doris and Ralph Martin created the Martin-Springer Institute for Teaching the Holocaust, Tolerance and Humanitarian Values at Northern Arizona University.
Ralph Martin explains that the goal of the institute is to serve "as a meaningful memorial to the victims of the Holocaust. We felt that the most meaningful memorial you can make would be to reduce the level of hatred and distrust in the world, so that something like the Holocaust wouldn't happen again."
Ralph Martin believes that a lot of the bullying and hatred found in schools stems from a lack of self-esteem.
"The basic reason that people put each other down and develop a hatred for other people is to build up a self-esteem the person lacks. If a person feels good about himself, he has no need to belittle other people or join in gangs or organizations that degrade any other type of people."
Ralph Martin feels the place to start is by training teachers.
"What we would like to do is to develop techniques where teachers can show students how they can improve their self image by doing something positive rather than (engaging) in negative actions to feel superior to other people," he explains.
Alex Alvarez came onboard as director of the institute this past summer. Alvarez, a sociologist, is a researcher and writer about genocide, war crimes and human rights violations. He has been at NAU for 11 years.
He sees the institute meeting the needs of three different groups: "Essentially, we are reaching out to three separate but connected communities. We are going to reach out ... to the K-12 teacher and student community," he explains. "We also see ourselves as serving the needs of the NAU community and the greater Arizona civic community."
The bulk of the institute's programming is still in the planning stages, says Alvarez. Future plans are to hold teacher training seminars and workshops, to create a moral courage award program to honor teachers and students and to develope a resource center with computers, books, videos and other tools.
In response to the Sept. 11 attacks, the institute helped organize guided discussions and teach-ins for students, faculty and community members.
"The day after (the attacks) we actually had a guided discussion - an evening where we had a variety of individuals, some who have done research on Islam, some (who) do work on healing and grief and bereavement," says Alvarez.
Alvarez later spoke at a teach-in that presented a variety of views about the current situation in the United States and the Middle East. The program then broke participants into small groups to discuss the ideas presented.
Currently, Alvarez says, the institute is involved in gauging the needs of the community.
"What we're doing is planning and creating (events) and meeting with a lot of different people to spread the word and find out what people in the school community and civic community need."
Additionally, the Martin-Springer Institute has plans to team up with the Anti-Defamation League and instruct teachers how to teach tolerance in our schools. This collaboration between the institute and ADL stems from a common set of goals - to provide education in order to reduce hatred, discrimination and prejudice.
The ADL was founded in 1913 as a civil rights organization, with a primary goal to stop bigotry against Jews. Then in 1985, the ADL began the World of Difference campaign, "to combat prejudice, promote democratic ideals and strengthen pluralism," according to ADL literature.
The first program in the World of Difference campaign was Classroom of Difference. This program includes teacher and student training in diversity issues. Subsequently, the ADL has developed A Campus of Difference, A Workplace of Difference and A Community of Difference programs.
The local office of the ADL is running the Classroom of Difference program in several school districts in the state under the supervision of Paul Wieser, associate regional director. Presently the program is used in the Pendergast, Paradise Valley, Gilbert, Phoenix Elementary, Mesa, Scottsdale, Dysart, Mingus and Tucson school districts.
Wieser explains that the program "involves training educators - classroom teachers - in ways to effectively combat prejudice, discrimination and intolerance as they find it in the classroom setting."
The training of teachers is generally done in one of two ways, explains Wieser. One is a full day of programming from Wieser and a staff of trainers. A second is a week-long session, in which 20 teachers in a district are taught to train the other teachers in the district.
Wieser has confidence that well-trained teachers will know better than anyone how to appropriately address diversity and tolerance issues in the classroom.
"What we hope to do is provide them with materials, strategies and activities that they can use in the classroom as they feel appropriate," says Wieser. "It's accommodating and flexible enough that they can integrate it as they see fit."
There are many issues addressed in the curriculum, including bullying, exclusion, prejudice and discrimination. Wieser believes that educating children about these issues will make a long-term difference in their perspective.
"I think that if a teacher really embraces this and ... makes it a priority in the classroom, I think kids will be sensitized to some of these issues," he explains.
Despite his belief that the program works, Wieser acknowledges that the success of the program is difficult to gauge.
"How do you know how many fires you've put out because of a particular lesson? How do you know how many behaviors will never manifest themselves because of something you've done? It's very hard to measure that," he concedes.
A concept important to Wieser is the training of teachers while they are still being educated in programs at the university level. While the state's teacher education programs provide teachers with skills in many aspects of the teaching profession, incoming teachers are not prepared to handle issues of diversity that arise in the classroom setting, he says.
Current plans are to run the ADL's Classroom of Difference Program for students in NAU's teacher education program in February.
He feels that part of teacher preparation should be to "have this anti-bias training under their belts and have these strategies and activities available to them as they meet challenges in the classroom," he explains.
For more information on the Martin-Springer Institute, call (928) 523-2464, or e-mail alex.alvarez@nau.edu. Paul Wieser can be reached at the ADL, 602-274-0991.
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