This year has been another momentous year. By the end of 2024, more than 50 countries will have held elections with over 1.5 billion people casting their votes. Protecting this democratic right to vote is vital; how we engage young people in their civic duty and support them to be critical and empathetic thinkers is more important than ever.
Your engagement with our work supports teachers to build brave classrooms and spaces where students can explore their identities and develop their opinions on issues that are affecting their school, family and community. Thank you for your support!
“Hope, cohesion and building a stronger democracy are not things that happen by accident - we need to seek out new perspectives, challenge our assumptions and find ways to work more collaboratively.”
Beki Martin – Executive Director, Facing History UK
Change Starts with Us
Two student reporters provide an account of our recent anniversary event as part of their work experience.
Change Starts with Us
Two student reporters provide an account of our recent anniversary event as part of their work experience.
Celebrating 20 Years of Facing History & Ourselves in the UK
On 21 June we held two events to showcase the work of Facing History UK and celebrate our twentieth anniversary.
We started with ‘An Afternoon of Dialogue’, inviting our community of supporters to meet our students, teachers and partners for conversation and learning. Together, we explored how we can use our individual civic agency to best effect. We wanted to bring together our community to think about the positive impact we can have as individuals, inspired by the actions of Facing History students.
Throughout the afternoon we saw our students, teachers and supporters meet this call by engaging in nuanced conversations around complex topics. At Facing History our goal is to create safe spaces for young people to ask questions, so that they are prepared to grapple with the present, through the lessons of the past.
“An inability or unwillingness to provide a safe space in which we can ask the questions we are grappling with limits our ability to form and voice educated opinions. It limits our ability to speak with knowledge and with confidence. We need safe spaces to ask questions, to understand, to empathise.”
Tallulah – Facing History Student
Tallulah’s comment speaks to the importance of Facing History’s work in supporting young people to develop resilience, critical thinking and media literacy skills, and to respond to people and information with both empathy and a critical lens.
Celebrating 20 years
Building on our ‘Afternoon of Dialogue’, our evening event centred the voices of three individuals who have been directly impacted by the ongoing conflict in the Middle East - Mira Awad, Hamze Awawde and Magen Inon.
Together, our three speakers shared their personal stories of the 7 October attack and ensuing violence, and experiences of living and working in the region. The common theme was one of a desire to come together in the face of this adversity - that we don’t need to agree on everything to acknowledge each other’s pain and work towards peace.
“Somehow it didn’t used to be that extreme, but now it is. We cannot see the humanity in the other side. Whether it's the soldier, politician, nurse or person in the street, it’s all the same. I refuse to accept this.”
-Hamze Awawde
A highlight of the evening was the open and honest Q&A, where people had the opportunity to ask questions of Mira, Hamze and Magen. We ended with such thoughtful and heartfelt dialogue that truly reflected Facing History’s approach.
A Busy Year of CPD Across the UK
This year our work to support teachers has taken us to Belfast, Manchester, Perth and Cardiff, to name but a few places. We have run training on a variety of topics, including Teaching An Inspector Calls, Navigating Challenging Conversations in the Classroom, and Discussing Contemporary Antisemitism and Islamophobia.
Thanks to the support of the Manchester Jewish Museum, we brought a group of teachers together for a one-day seminar on Teaching Holocaust and Human Behaviour in July. Framed by the ongoing violence in the Middle East, and its effects on social cohesion here, the day also proved an important opportunity to discuss contemporary antisemitism and the impact of racial and religious hatred in all forms on our communities and young people.
I thought it was a really rich space for discussing approaches to the Holocaust education in an empathetic, critical and emotional response. I have come away with new knowledge on the histories, as well as supportive tools to help young people explore these histories and their own sense of self.
We have met heightened teacher need for support in discussing the conflict in the Middle East with a varied programme of in-person and online workshops for schools, ITE providers and DEI networks, as well as webinars and panel discussions with partner organisations such as Solutions Not Sides and the Faith & Belief Forum.
This year we also ran a one-day seminar with our partner Corrymeela in Northern Ireland, exploring materials from our Standing Up for Democracy and a two-day residential Teaching Holocaust and Human Behaviour.
We are also excited to be developing a partnership with WOSDEC that will bring our resources and CPD to more Scottish educators, beginning with an in-person session in Perth, and with online training opportunities to come in the new year.
Teaching HHB Workshop, Corrymeela
Taken at our Teaching Holocaust and Human Behaviour workshop in Northern Ireland. Hosted with our partner organisation, Corrymeela.
Across the year we have held a number of teacher conversations across topics ranging from How to Address Homophobic, Biphobic and Transphobic Language in the Classroom to Commemorating Holocaust Memorial Day. Following the Stockport murders and outbreak of civil unrest in the summer, we invited teachers to join us online for support in how to discuss the events with their students, sharing resources from our Building A Classroom Community, Teaching in the Wake of Violence, Discussing Contemporary Islamophobia and Developing Media Literacy units.
“Thank you so much for putting on this very timely, carefully considered and thoughtful event. It's given me the confidence to tackle some really tricky issues in school, and has saved me so much time and energy in terms of resourcing.”
Developing Media Literacy for Well-being, Relationships and Democracy
Teach students about media literacy, helping them develop as critical consumers and creators of information, in order to support their well-being, their relationships and our democracy.
Developing Media Literacy for Well-being, Relationships and Democracy
Teach students about media literacy, helping them develop as critical consumers and creators of information, in order to support their well-being, their relationships and our democracy.
New Resources This Year
To support the launch of our new unit, we have run a number of CPD opportunities both online and in person, for our broader teacher network, as well as for individual schools and teaching networks. We are grateful to Drew Benvie, CEO of Battenhall for sharing his social media expertise in our recent webinar on Supporting Students to Engage with Social Media in Healthy and Constructive Ways.
Stay tuned for two upcoming lessons: ‘Avoiding 'Othering' and Polarisation When Engaging in Social Action’ and ‘Exploring the Work of Peace Builders.’ We also publish new and revised assemblies every month, which you can find on our Ideas This Week page.
2024 Event Highlights
Facing History's work goes beyond the classroom, with opportunities to explore important topics in a variety of ways.
In September, we held an event hosted by the U.S. Embassy in London for students, teachers and Facing History community members on navigating the social media landscape. Attendees were welcomed to the event by Rodney Ford, the Minister Counselor for Public Affairs, and Beki Martin, Executive Director of Facing History UK, before hearing from an expert panel and participating in a Facing History lesson on misinformation, disinformation and mal-information.
We were delighted to have Philippe Sands KC speak at our Salon in November. Philippe spoke on a range of topics, in particular the recent ruling by the International Court of Justice on the Chagos Islands and the focus of his most recent book ‘The Last Colony’. The conversation also covered the state of democracy around the world and the technical, and often misunderstood, nature of International Law.
This year, our approach has helped thousands of young people think more critically and empathetically, and recognise their own agency to change their schools and communities for the better. Thank you for sharing our vision. We're so excited to see what the next year holds.
We would like to wish you and your loved ones a very healthy, happy and peaceful winter break.
Beki and the Facing History UK team
