GRADE LEVEL: Elementary School, Middle School COMMON CORE STANDARDS: Writing, Speaking & Listening SEL STANDARDS*: Self Awareness, Self-Management, Social Awareness, Relationship Skills, Responsible Decision-Making Bullying is a major problem in our schools. When it targets aspects of a person’s identity, it is called identity-based bullying, and may include bias about appearance, race, culture, gender and gender expression, language, religion, socioeconomic status,…
October is National Bullying Prevention Month
National Bullying Prevention Month is an opportunity to reflect on the classroom and school culture and assess the extent to which bullying is part of that culture. It is a time to examine best practices when it comes to creating respectful school environments that foster inclusion and respect. The large body of research on effective responses to name-calling and bullying concurs that schools and other educational institutions can best…
by: Oren Segal July 29, 2014 If you have been reviewing any number of parenting or education blogs lately, you’ll see headlines proclaiming the menace and dangers of technology. Technology, and more specifically, social media and mobile apps are often treated like “monsters” to guard against and the creators of all matter of social ills. Even if technology is scary and daunting to some adults, for youth it is a necessary and positive part of life. In…
Letter to UN Secretary General Ban on Israel Comments
Letter
July 22, 2014 The Honorable Ban Ki-Moon Secretary General United Nations
Dear Mr. Secretary General,
We were surprised by the uncharacteristically harsh and one-sided tenor and content of the remarks you made to the press during your visit to Doha on Sunday.
One cannot fail to feel pain and anguish one feels for the suffering befalling the people of Gaza. Yet, at a time when morally responsible leaders are asking "What kind of human being indiscriminately fires thousands of…
Letter to Her Excellency, President of Argentina Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner
Letter
July 18, 2014 Her Excellency Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner
President of the Argentine Republic
Balcarce 50, CP 1064
Ciudad Autónoma de Buenos Aires
Argentina
Dear Madam President:
On the twentieth anniversary of the July 18, 1994 terrorist bombing of the AMIA-DAIA building in Buenos Aires, we once again recall the 85 innocent Argentinian victims who died tragically and the hundreds who were wounded on that day.
Madam President, we appreciate your…
July 18, 2014 Mr. Leonardo Jmelnitzky
President
Asociación Mutual Israelita Argentina (AMIA)
Pasteur 633 (C1028 AMM)
Buenos Aires
Argentina
Dear Mr. Jmelnitzky:
As the twentieth anniversary of the terrorist attack on the Jewish community's AMIA-DAIA building in Buenos Aires, Argentina approaches, we once again express our solidarity with the Argentinean Jewish community and remember the eighty-five innocent victims who lost their lives and the hundreds of others…
by: Mark Onofrio March 17, 2014 A teacher raises his hand in A World of Difference® Institute training and says, "I like to kid around with my students." He says, "I like to have fun in my class so they are more likely to come to me when they need help."
He calls one student his “favorite Mexican,” another student “Dopey” and the only African-American student “MLK” (short for Martin Luther King Jr.) This well-intentioned…
For Educators In many of ADL’s lesson plans and activities, students are challenged to explore and articulate their personal feelings about sensitive topics including segregation, discrimination, and the value of diverse school communities. Talking about themes related to diversity requires that students demonstrate maturity and compassion for others. In conjunction with social justice curricula, it is therefore recommended that teachers use service learning, conflict resolution,…
‘That’s So Gay’: Language That Hurts, and How to Stop It
Article
January 21, 2014
The phrase "that’s so gay" has persisted as a way for students to describe things they do not like, find annoying or generally want to put down, while it is promising that fewer students are hearing homophobic slurs than in previous years.
The phrase is used so commonly that many students no longer recognize it as homophobic because it is “what everyone says.” When educators and other adults intervene, common student responses include “I was just…
by: Mark Onofrio January 07, 2014 Youth are the real experts on what is happening in bullying on school campuses, and yet their voices, perspectives and leadership are rarely integrated into bullying prevention programs.
“Just ask the kids” is the tagline for a new book highlighting research from the Youth Voice Project, the first large-scale research project on bullying and peer mistreatment that did exactly that—ask the kids (more than 13,000 teens in 31 schools). …
November 18, 2013 CHANGING HEARTS AND MINDS A dynamic young leader in the immigration reform movement, Lorella Praeli first met ADL after she was bullied in school.
My first exposure to ADL was just after graduating from middle school in Connecticut. I’d gone through a really ugly experience with cyberbullying at a time when no one knew what to do about it, plus I had my own self-doubts about being a Latina with a disability. The training for ADL’s Names Can Really Hurt Us program…
For Law Enforcement
Read the full, comprehensive report: Profile: Omar Hammami
Omar Hammami, an American citizen from Alabama who once served as primary recruiter for Al Shabaab, the Somali-based terrorist organization affiliated with Al Qaeda, was killed September 13, 2013 at age 29 by members of Al Shabaab.
Between 2007 and 2011, he was a public face and voice of Al Shabaab and a critical part of the terrorist organization's effort to recruit English-speakers. Hammami was…
Ben White, the author of Israeli Apartheid: A Beginner’s Guide and co-author of Palestinians in Israel: Segregation, Discrimination and Democracy, is an anti-Israel speaker who regularly delivers presentations on American college campuses.
A graduate of Cambridge University in the UK, White is a supporter of a one-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict – which is predicated on the dismantlement of Israel as a Jewish state – and an advocate for the Boycott,…
For Law Enforcement
Introduction
The Pakistani-based terrorist group Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), which has carried out numerous attacks against American interests in Pakistan and Afghanistan, has warned of future terror attacks inside the U.S.
While TTP originally focused its attacks on Pakistani and American installations in Pakistan and Afghanistan in order to implement shari'a, or Islamic law, the May 2010 attempted bombing in Times Square is indicative of the group's…
IntroductionHizb ut-Tahrir (HT), an international organization that seeks to establish a worldwide Islamic theocracy, is increasing its efforts to spread its message and recruit members in the U.S. The American branch of HT convened its 2012 Khilafah Conference, titled "Revolution: Liberation by Revelation," on June 17, 2012, in the Chicago suburb of Hickory Hills, IL. Messages at the conference primarily centered on promoting the organization's vision of establishing a worldwide Caliphate and…
June 21, 2013 Read the full report: Extremism in Connecticut (PDF)
Summary
The public often associates extreme anti-government or hate groups with remote, rugged states in the Pacific Northwest or the rural South. Despite these perceptions, extremism in America is spread far and wide. New England is home to its share of extreme groups and movements, just as are the Pacific Northwest and the South.
Connecticut -- despite its small size -- has witnessed some of the most intensive and…
For Law Enforcement This document is an archived copy of an older ADL report and may not reflect the most current facts or developments related to its subject matter. Public Enemy Number 1 (PENI) is an unusual hybrid of a racist skinhead gang, street gang and prison gang. Since the early 2000s, the group has grown considerably, particularly in California, where it originated, and has also spread to nearby states. PENI's increasing strength stems to a large degree from its ability to position…
For Law Enforcement This document is an archived copy of an older ADL report and may not reflect the most current facts or developments related to its subject matter. Volksfront, a virulently racist and anti-Semitic group, has become the most active neo-Nazi group on the West Coast and maintains close alliances with many other hate groups. Since its creation in 1994, the group has been growing nationally and internationally. One of Volksfront’s primary goals is to establish an autonomous…
The Arab American News, a.k.a. Sada Al Watan (Arabic for “Echo of the homeland”), is a dual-language Arabic-English newspaper published weekly in Dearborn, Michigan. Established in 1984 by publisher Osama A. Siblani, the paper has been described as the largest Arab community newspaper in the U.S. by the U.S. government-funded AlHurra satellite television station.
It has an “unaudited circulation of 30,000 in the Detroit area,” according to a 2009 report by the Pew…