Mobile Museum of Tolerance hosts lessons at Kings Park High School
The lessons focus on how to understand the online hate, dig through what is real and what is fake, and then provide tools on how to respond to it.
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Kings Park High School has a special guest this week - the brand new Mobile Museum of Tolerance.
"We definitely wanted to do something different here," explained Assistant Principal Darlene Maffei, who helped book the program.
The giant RV is spending two days hosting students for lessons on online hate - something student, and ambassador for the school's "No Place For Hate" organization Lauren Ayres says "is putting a purpose into students in our school and can help make a big difference."
The lessons focus on how to understand the online hate, dig through what is real and what is fake, and then provide tools on how to respond to it.
"Cyberbullying and online things of hatred are so prominent," says Ayres. "If the world is going to become online, then we want everyone to feel safe and at home."
Both Ayres and Maffei say they hope the unique setting of the lessons - which forces students to get up and out of the classroom, will help it resonate more.
Ayres says how interactive the lessons are also helps, including both iPads and an emphasis on conversation which "was able to make (other students) feel like it's OK to speak up and talk about how they've experience, and what they can do about it."
Ayres says she hopes even after the RV leaves, those lessons stick, especially that if her classmates "see something, they should say something obviously, and that they should always treat everyone with respect."
