The news—and disturbing footage—of police officers assaulting an unarmed black teenager in Florida last week shines yet another spotlight on the dangers black youth face every day. Your students have likely seen the video and conversation surrounding #JusticeForLucca. These resources will help you understand how this violent footage can affect students, how to discuss this news with them and how you can bring #BlackLivesMatter into your classroom.
Even if your students are too young to vote, there are plenty of ways they can get involved in the last few days of this year's election season. Try sharing our Voting and Voices pledge and Story Corner video to encourage them to talk with their families about voting. Or check out our Voting and Voices classroom resources for ready-to-use lessons, texts and activities that can get students of all ages excited about Tuesday's elections!
Despite the diverse coalition of activists who fought for its passage, the 19th Amendment didn’t bring voting equality to all women. Women’s Equality Day offers an opportunity to correct the record and explore how a whitewashed version of history is sustained and supported to this day. These resources can help you encourage students to think critically about this important anniversary, celebrate steps toward justice and recognize the injustices we still need to fight.
This Suicide Prevention Week—September 10 is World Suicide Prevention Day—support your students and your school community. These resources can help. Use this toolkit to help reduce mental health stigma, promote wellness and acknowledge the mental health needs of students and staff alike. Inform your students about support available through the Crisis Text Line, and use the E.D.G.E. technique to help students support one another throughout the year.
Students and educators have faced countless, unprecedented hardships over the past two school years. We hope that during this Mental Illness Awareness Week, you’ll incorporate mental health literacy into your work with students. These LFJ resources highlight ways to destigmatize mental illness and feature tips for interrupting harmful school practices, which especially affect Black youth. We all need to be good to ourselves and to each other.
To mark the anniversary, teach a more complex version of this historic milestone and the civil rights movement. LFJ has resources to help. Listen to this podcast episode and watch this webinar—based upon our guide by the same title—to help students delve deeper into the history of Rosa Parks and the Montgomery Bus Boycott. For additional context, students can discuss Browder v. Gayle, an often unheard-of civil rights case that overturned segregated public transportation in the South.