In the first unit of the Argument class, we talked about what an argument is and what it is made up of. We focused on the elements of an argument and how we can craft one. We took a look at the Declaration of Independence and fully analyzed the argument that it makes. For this action project we were asked to create a class that could be taught at school. I chose to create a class about human rights called The Rights That We Deserve. I want students to learn about what rights they have and when it is important for them to know and use them. Something I struggled with was a creative title. I am proud of my course and I think that it could have real potential. I hope you enjoy my declaration.
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| MF. Human Rights, 2016 |
The purpose of school is to educate people on things that they need to know in order to succeed. School is a place of people teaching other people about different things they need to know. It is a place for people of all different ages to come together to learn and teach one another about the basics of life. Learning is extremely important to our mind and soul because it helps us better ourselves by showing us things we didn't know and helping us achieve our goals. Whether it’s learning a math equation or just how to speak better, everything makes a difference. Our unalienable rights are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. In The Rights That We Deserve, we will be diving deep into the rights we as Americans have as well as looking into current events that use these rights and the rights of different countries. All around the world there are places that have no rights or rights that are not being recognized by the government like the Democratic Republic of Congo, Palestine, Syria and many others. This class will show us that we need to take into consideration our rights that we have and how we as Americans are lucky that we have any rights at all. Our rights at GCE are to be able to explore and learn things that will lead us in the direction we want to go in with our lives. GCE helps us become better people. Talking about current events is a way to better your understanding of what's going on and there have been plenty of cases having to do with people in power not recognizing other people’s rights. For example with all of the police shootings that have been going on, the police just took the lives of innocent people without hesitation and without warning. This is something that a lot of people have had serious discussions about that are worth paying attention to. If people don’t know their rights, this will continue to happen.
My guiding question for this course is when is it important to know our human rights? We as humans need to understand the rights we have and when it is important to know/use them like if we are in a situation with police they have to read you your Miranda rights or else you can not be tried, this can make or break a case. I want this to be a summer emersion class for outgoing juniors- incoming seniors so that they will be able to understand their human rights according to the constitution and the declaration and be able to explain them so they can prepare for their senior year humanities classes. If someone is passionate about something, they should be able to speak freely about whatever it is without worry of restriction. For this class we can partner with a lot of different organizations that specialize in human rights such as International Federation for Human Rights, International Foundation for Human Rights and Tolerance International, Freedom of Expression Exchange, Heartland Alliance, The Human Rights Watch etc. These organizations can explain to students about the fight for rights in America and in different places around the globe. The Human Rights Watch (based in Chicago) hosts annual trips to different countries that are struggling to help them get back on their feet. This would be a great opportunity for the students to experience some things first hand.
For the first unit of the course of The Rights That We Deserve, I want to focus on America's rights, for the second I want to focus on the rights that other countries around the world may or may not have, specifically The Congo, Syria, and Palestine. The third unit would be a comparison of the rights we as Americans have and how they differ from other countries. One of the action projects could be protesting something or declaring something they are passionate about while another could be envisioning what it would be like to try to protest something in another country that may not have the same rights as us. . I want the students to do some research on current events having to do with human rights and find a way to let a big group of people know about it. I want the students to have a chance to get up and talk to a group of people about something they are passionate about. There are many documentaries about human rights such as Call Me Kuchu, The Farm: Angola, USA, The Thin Blue Line, and many more; these are all available on netflix.
I declare that we should have a class on human rights. We need to understand the things that we have a right to and how we can access those. We need to realize that even though our rights are not noticed all of the time, there are some countries whose rights are never noticed and I really want to shed light on that so students can understand the rights that we have and how we are fortunate to have them at all.
