Journalists and NGOs often rely on each other to inform the world. But beware vested interests. It’s best to follow the money trail to see the full picture. A sign that counter-protesters lit on fire burns after supporters of U.S. President Donald Trump held...
I joined protests against police brutality in my home country of Nigeria and saw them almost become a war, then a rude awakening for youth. Protesters in Umuahia, Nigeria, October 2020 (All photos courtesy of Eje Studios) This story was a runner-up in News...
Joy Chinaza takes us into the streets of Nigeria to join young people protesting against police brutality. Like youth elsewhere this year, she is driven by anger over rights abuses perpetrated by police charged with protecting civilians but who instead turn weapons against minorities. A shared sense of injustice motivates Chinaza and millions of others around the globe, making her story a metaphor for youthful outrage. But the personal details in the tale by the African Leadership Academy student, including the beating her own brother suffers, add poignancy that sets her account apart. Make sure students note how the first-person pronoun draws them into the story. And how her outrage — so common among youth — is tinged with ambiguity at the end.
Most cities are built and governed by men. Experts are taking into account the needs of women as they reshape our urban spaces. Women collect water near Bhopal, India, 2 May 2020. (EPA-EFE/SANJEEV GUPTA) More than 83% of Egyptian women have been sexually harassed...
Youth in Nigeria, angry over police brutality, have formed a movement that started with street protests and which some see as a potential political force. Youth protest against Nigeria’s Special Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS) in Lagos, Nigeria, 9 October 2020....
Joe Biden’s win over Donald Trump in the U.S. presidential election is cause for celebration. But it’s also time for America to heal its deep divisions. A Biden supporter hugs a Trump supporter after an impromptu debate between members of both political...
California student Lucy Jaffee interviewed renowned free-speech expert Floyd Abrams to write a forward-looking article on a landmark court case. Lucy Jaffee Lucy Jaffee was researching a complicated U.S. court case involving students’ right to freedom of speech....
A U.S. school district wants the Supreme Court to overturn a landmark free speech case and let it punish a student for criticizing her school online. Students protest for the right to free speech outside the Supreme Court in Washington, DC, 19 March 2007. (AP...
Lucy Jaffee of La Jolla Country Day School tackled a complicated topic — a court case involving a student’s freedom of speech and social media — by interviewing two experts, including the foremost authority on the U.S. First Amendment, Floyd Abrams. The lesson: If you put effort into understanding an issue, experts will be glad to speak to you. Students should contact experts because they will offer unique insights and help answer the question, “What next?”
The case Jaffee’s article focuses on lends itself to classroom discussion because it engages a matter of great interest to students. While students may instinctively side with the young woman whose Snapchat post triggered the controversy, there may be other off-campus outbursts on social media — Holocaust denial, racist language — that they might like to see sanctioned. Like so much in life, First Amendment issues often lie in the gray zone.
Millions of people around the world are stateless, with no rights and condemned to living in the shadows, on the margins of society. A Muslim Rohingya boy inside a shelter at an internally displaced person camp near the capital of Sittwe, Myanmar, 9 March 2017...
A viral campaign on Instagram meant to empower women has its recent roots in a bleak reality familiar to women who are victims of violence in Turkey. Women march in support of the Istanbul Convention on preventing violence against women, Istanbul, Turkey, 19 July...
The Uighurs are not the only ethnic minority in China. Beijing’s repressive tactics reflect fears a separatist movement could threaten the state. Uighurs in Hotan, northwest China’s Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region, 6 April 2008 (AP Photo/Eugene Hoshiko) Last...