Diversity in Schools
The project "Diversity in Schools" aims to develop innovative and transferable approaches and methods for education work in schools to promote an open, respectful, and community-oriented school culture.
During the three-year project with three secondary schools in Berlin, modules for cultural and historico-political education will be developed by teachers. These modules will be based on the questions and practical needs of teachers and with them appropriate, modern approaches and content will be integrated into school life. The content of the modules will cover cultural education, the teaching of history and migration, and handling stereotypical representations in school textbooks. Moreover, the teachers’ intercultural and diversity skills are deepened during the training and their media skills expanded. In parallel, the management and the teaching staff will be advised on the school development process and given ongoing support for fostering intercultural awareness in school. The project is held in coordination with the education authority with the aim of making the experiences and results available to other schools.
Diversity in schools is a project organized by the Jewish Museum Berlin in cooperation with the German Children and Youth Foundation funded by the Mercator Foundation.
The project began on 1 February 2012 and will end in January 2015.
The Leo Baeck Program "Jewish Life in Germany - Schools and Continuing Education"
Since 1 January 2013, the Education Department of the Jewish Museum Berlin has undertaken advising and supervising the content and methodology of projects supported by the Leo Baeck program "Jewish Life in Germany – Schools and Continuing Education." The Leo Baeck program is organized and financed by the Foundation "Remembrance, Responsibility, and Future." (Stiftung "Erinnerung, Verantwortung und Zukunft" [EVZ])
The program of the EVZ includes the communication of German-Jewish history through curricular and extracurricular educational institutions and supports educational projects that pursue an integrative approach. This means understanding the history of Jews in Germany as mainstream history. Jewish history is to be discussed and developed in the classroom as part of general history – because it was and is not special history.
The objective of the Leo Baeck program is to fund in particular projects that show Jewish life in Germany without focusing exclusively on the Nazi era. The intention is to not only reduce Jews to their role as victims of Nazi policy, but portray them in their professional, social, political, and family life before and after National Socialism.
Support is given for teacher training and curricular as well as extracurricular activities such as workshops exploring local Jewish history, but also educational services in which online and print products are developed. Around 30 projects are funded every year, each with up to 6,000 euros.
Further information on the Leo Baeck program including the current tender deadlines can be found here.
Retrospective additions to and thorough indexing of the collection of fine and applied arts, visual and material culture
The German Research Foundation is supporting the library of the Jewish Museum Berlin as part of its promotion of outstanding research libraries and will expand, develop, and index the holdings of the art classification group.
The existing literature in Germany on Jewish visual and applied arts, visual and material culture is spread over many locations today and due to its interdisciplinary nature is not considered in all its breadth in the acquisition profiles of academic libraries. A central point of contact in the form of a library specialized in this field of research does not exist to date.
The project applied for with the German Research Foundation builds on the existing collection at the Jewish Museum Berlin library, and has the aim of systematically filling the gaps. In addition, the targeted acquisition of gray literature and non-book media and the completion of the museums’ special collections will provide the world of research with source material that is otherwise difficult to access as well as an attractive research environment to study it in. The thorough indexing and linking to the Jewish Museum Berlin thesaurus makes a theme-oriented and cross-media search possible that incorporates the museum’s collections and archives and thereby provides access to the primary sources. Developing a collection focus of national importance that contributes in the long term to reestablishing the research tradition in Germany that was broken in 1933 is the primary objective.
The project began in fall 2013 and will end in fall 2015.