In 2010, University of San Francisco EdD candidate Andrea McEvoy Spero conducted her dissertation research on our three-day professional development workshop. Her dissertation, “This is a Public Record”: Teaching Human Rights: Through The Performing Arts provides an overview of the history and field of human rights education (HRE) as well as an in-depth look at how our program participants and their students engaged with HRE through the arts.
Citation
Spero, A. M. (2012). “’This is a Public Record’: Teaching Human Rights Through The Performing Arts” (41). Doctoral dissertation, University of San Francisco. https://repository.usfca.edu/diss/41
Learn more about Dr. Andrea McEvoy Spero’s work
“Human Rights Education and the Performing Arts”
Andrea McEvoy Spero, EdD, Peace Review: A Journal of Social Justice
“Schools are cultural and political spheres and, therefore, are the location for cultural and societal norms, values, and language. When students take the stage and proclaim, in their own words, the harsh realities of their lives, it is a powerful political act. … Teaching human rights through performance poetry holds a potential path to a culture of human dignity. To achieve true transformative change, we must find ways to build critical consciousness and activism among youth so that they may create a new reality.”
Bringing Human Rights Education to US Classrooms:
Exemplary Models from Elementary Grades to University
Editors Susan Roberta Katz & Andrea McEvoy Spero
“This book offers research-based models of exemplary practice for educators at all grade levels, from primary school to university, who want to integrate human rights education into their classrooms. It includes ten examples of projects that have been effectively implemented in classrooms: two from elementary school, two from middle school, three from high school, two from community college, and one from a university. Each model discusses the scope of the project, its rationale, students’ response to the content and pedagogy, challenges or controversies that arose, and their resolution. Unique in integrating theory and practice and in addressing human rights issues with special relevance for communities of color in the US, this book provides indispensable guidance for those studying and teaching human rights.”
