You Spoke, We Listened

Reader Reactions

Our student-friendly video, Intersectionality 101, made a big splash on social media. Haven’t watched it yet? Take a look.

@Tolerance_org this is such a helpful tool to educate kids & adults on the social issues that are all too often ignored, thank you!
—Tracy Hunter, via Twitter

Excellent video & incredible talent! (Also very much appreciate the inclusion of people with disabilities!)
—Emily Landers, via Facebook

Letters

Looking ahead to the 2016-17 school year—and the election—got many readers thinking and talking!

Civil Civics

THANK YOU! I’ve been feeling a desperate need to figure out how to teach civil discourse to my 7th graders. Today you sent me the very documents and guidelines for how to do it! WOW! Thank you!
—Kerri Lorigan, via email

Editor's note: You can access our web package of election-related resources here.

Love for Perspectives

Extraordinary collection of materials! This Perspectives for a Diverse America saved hundreds of hours of research and preparation and yields results far beyond what I could have accomplished! Thank you!
—Anonymous, via survey

Light-Bulb Moments

Thank you for the amazing work that you do. I am so thankful for the support you offer to teachers. I have witnessed students becoming more aware of their history and what is currently going on in our world. These “light-bulb” moments for kids often follow valuable discussions that we have using Teaching Tolerance. Thank you again and keep up the great work.
—Kim Geer-Marchetti, via email 

Moved by The Trump Effect

That hurt to read. I knew it was a problem, but some of the stories pulled from the findings made me sick.
—Chris Miles, via Facebook

Not TT's Place

[On The Trump Effect] The fact that most teachers are extremely liberal and worried about Trump does not change the fact it is not your job to enter the political arena ... in my humble opinion. … Perhaps if you hadn’t put a giant picture of Trump on front and been over the top derogatory throughout, then your argument that it was about discourse in a classroom would hold water. It doesn’t as long as the picture speaks louder than your words.
—Marcia Want, via email

Editor’s note: We received an extraordinary number of responses to The Trump Effect. Read how this report affected an entire school district in “If It Can Happen Here…”

Language Matters

If you were really about tolerance you wouldn’t be using the term colorblind. There’s over 300 million people in the world just like me that are colorblind that are looking for information on being colorblind. ...  Colorblindness is an abnormality in your eyeball, not a racist point of view.
—Mike Lennart, via email

Reading Between the Lines

[On “We Can’t Dismantle What We Can’t See”] Literature aimed at identifying social ills has a short shelf life. I don’t feel Golding [in Lord of the Flies] was dissecting hyper-masculinity. I would argue he was taking on the perennial struggle between good and evil, right and wrong, more specifically culture versus chaos. Because he wrote [about] adolescent boys, they behaved like adolescent boys. I didn’t read into it any more than that. I worry that if I make everything I read about a social issue, I’ll miss the greater truth about humanity it has to offer.
—Casey Ferguson, via Facebook 

Fuel for Discussion

Just a quick note of thanks for all the amazing topics you put out there for educators. I am so thrilled to be on your emailing list. I follow your stories and do discuss and teach topics you’ve shared. Those have been my most powerful class discussions and total class climate builders! Thanks for all you do to make your publications so real for my students (and me too, of course!).
—Tami Lamerato, via email

Editor's note: Do you get our weekly newsletter? Subscribe here.

Changing Lives 

Teaching Tolerance is something I look forward to receiving in the mail. I cannot even count the number of times I have used your magazine as a classroom resource! It’s wonderful and by far my favorite!! Keep up the good work!! You’re changing lives!!
—Kelley Hendricks, via email

Stellar Tweet

[On “Anatomy of an Ally”] @Tolerance_org magazine examines how teachers can be effective allies for students. Amazing resource!
—Michelle Gutierrez @michgutierrez, via Twitter

Stellar Facebook Comment

One of my most favorite resources for the last decade is and has been Teaching Tolerance. ... [T]hey bring up some very important points in how each of us “reflect” and explore our biases: either by looking through a window or by looking in a mirror. Great analogy!
—Star Ali Mistriel, via Facebook