National Student Seminar NOVEMBER 2008
New and continuing Arab and Jewish university and college students met in late November for the Two-Day, Year-Opening Students' National Seminar. This was an opportunity for our two-hundred students and volunteers to interact, learn, exchange ideas and thoughts, and to identify the common threads that draw them together.
Emphasizing choice and variety, the seminar offered an extensive array of workshops related to Mahapach-Taghir's activities, among which were:
Prevailing gaps in educational resources and opportunities in Israel ('Tracking') that deals with early-age discrimination in education according to scholastic achievements; Introduction to Critical Pedagogy - the guiding principles of Mahapach-Taghir's work; The characteristics of Disempowered Communities; and Conflicts between Jews and Palestinians in 'mixed cities'. The second day of the seminar offered four parallel workshops which took place under the title 'Introduction to Social Change Organizations in Israel', and introduced the work of 'Gisha', 'Zochrot', and 'The Public Committee against Torture in Israel' to students who were previously unfamiliar with their work.
Workshops, lectures and informal interactions were conducted both in Hebrew and in Arabic. While in past years the bi-lingual seminar was frequently met with a certain discomfort on behalf of the Arab students, this year, as one of the participants said,-
"Speaking in two languages – Hebrew and Arabic – made me feel a sense of justice and legitimized my presence"
The seminar provided numerous opportunities – both formal and informal – for raising social and political awareness amongst the students. For many, the exposure to new perspectives, even if these were not always easy to accept, promoted a dialogue based on equality and openness. For many, this was a rare and important opportunity to talk about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, about the Israeli occupation, discrimination, and about racially mixed cities. As part of our belief in Mahapach-Taghir that a real dialogue can only take place in an environment where all can express their opinions and be heard, we found these discussions important and insightful, as did many of the students.
