Jewish parents are facing intense issues in schools and they are responding by working together. The key to organizing effective actions and sustainable movements is to be creative, empathetic, and solution-oriented—and to pay attention to what your group needs next. This JCRC Bay Area guide will walk you through the steps to make your group as effective as possible.
FOCUS
From the outset, make absolutely clear what you’re responding to and who you will be addressing.
You may find yourself facing:
- Individual antisemitism by a teacher or teachers and/or faculty
- Students safety on campus
- Problematic curriculum in the classrooms
You might want to address issues at:
- An individual school
- The elementary, middle or high school level or college
- School administration/district
ORGANIZE
Next, identify what’s important for your group and who will facilitate.
- Identify a “lead” person to centralize information gathering and dissemination
- If you want to address more than one issue, consider breaking into small groups to work on different areas
- Consider whether or not each issue should have a different “lead”
- Decide how often you will meet as a whole group and as smaller task forces
- Identify skill sets of group members and delineate tasks based on those skills, i.e. a writer, a speaker, someone with connections to a school board member, etc.
- Determine how your group will communicate and stay up to date with everyone’s work
SET GOALS
Once you’ve found your focus and organized your group, need to decide what you will accomplish and what specific outcome you’re hoping for.
- What are your group’s specific asks?
- What types of engagement will help?
- With which allies do you need to build relationships?
STRATEGIZE
Plan out how you can best accomplish your goals.
Set concrete deadlines:
- What will you be doing in three-to-five days?
- Two weeks?
- 30 days, 60 days, 90 days, etc.?
Think about a timeline of your group’s needs:
- Short term
- Medium term
- Long term
Identify the steps needed to reach your goals
Advocate for patience; Rome wasn’t built in a day
DOs and DON’Ts
DO use this opportunity to strengthen community and bring people together across communities
DO take care of yourself; you’ll do better work if you rest, recover, and stay safe
DO create structure, delegate responsibilities, and decide how you will communicate and coordinate (consider shared tools, such as Google or Dropbox, to organize your documents)
DON’T have so much internal structure that you slow group decision-making
DON’T try to do everything; focus on the issue(s) most important to you
RESOURCES
Guide to Recognizing Problematic Rhetoric (JCRC Bay Area)
Know Your Rights: Demonstrations and Protests (ACLU)
Who are the Primary Groups Behind the U.S. Anti-Israel Rallies? (ADL)
CASE STUDY (EXAMPLE)
Situation: In this imaginary scenario, antisemitic harassment has occurred at your child’s school when another student told them, “From the river to the sea, Palestine should be free.” Your child doesn’t think the teacher would understand why that statement is offensive and doesn’t feel safe returning to the classroom.
FOCUS – This was a case of student-to-student harassment. Your child deserves to feel safe going to school. You gathered a group of similarly minded parents to take this matter to the teacher and the administration.
ORGANIZE – Gather your group. Choose a “lead.” Organize talking points.
SET GOALS
Goal 1 – Teacher training for the child’s teacher to better understand the rhetoric used and how it is offensive
Goal 2 – Administrative support to reassure the community that the school is safe
Goal 3 – Disciplinary action against the student who used hate-speech at school; they should learn and do repair work
STRATEGIZE
Makes sure the goals align with the student code of conduct as much as possible
Think about a timeline. For example:
Short term – child needs to feel safe and needs to know who to turn to if they don’t
Medium term – statement from the school condoning hate-speech
Long term – education and repair work for the child using hate-speech
