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HDC Set to Launch in Classrooms Across Antique Province

The province of Antique in the Philippines is set to use the Human Dignity Curriculum as part of their provincewide Human Dignity Education Program (HDEP) for 2025-2026.

Over 500 schools and over a hundred thousand students across the Province will now have the opportunity to learn about human dignity, freedom, solidarity, and human rights.

Learn more about the curriculum

In March 2024, Antique, Philippines, adopted a provincial ordinance institutionalizing the Human Dignity Curriculum in all public and private schools. The provincial ordinance was sponsored by Antique Board Member Dr. Mayella Mae Plameras-Ladislao and signed into law by Antique Governor Rhodora J. Cadiao.

Sta. Rita Academy—a private K-6 Catholic school in the town of Sibalom—was the first school in Antique to pilot the Human Dignity Curriculum. Since then, the curriculum has also been piloted in schools in San Jose de Buenavista, Sebaste, and Libertad with great success.

With a focus on self-worth, respect, and positive life choices, the program has shown great results in the pilot schools. Parents and educators are seeing real behavioral changes in HDC students. They’ve reported that their kids have become more humble, obedient, considerate towards siblings, and respectful.

“I now begin to see some changes in the attitude of the students and how they treat one another and other people because of the Human Dignity Curriculum. They are able to readily accept failures, to have a more positive attitude, to try their best to be better, and to nurture hope in their heart,” says one teacher who piloted the program.

We are happy and proud to see the HDC taking off in the Philippines with this new province-wide implementation. As WYA celebrates this exciting milestone, we want to thank all the local partners, parents, educators, religious leaders, and community leaders who’ve helped bring the Human Dignity Curriculum to Antique Province. Because of their hard work and sacrifices, the lives of thousands of children will be transformed through this curriculum.

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Human Dignity Curriculum: Teachers’ comfort, commitment, and perceived support teaching a new socioemotional learning curriculum

Moira A. Law*†

  • Department of Psychology, Saint Mary’s University, Halifax, NS, Canada

Globally, young people are experiencing unprecedented levels of socio-emotional loneliness, stress, and uncertainty. Formulating insight into their own and others’ experiences and behaviors is especially important during unsettling times and can be facilitated with socioemotional learning (SEL) curriculums. When implementing SEL programs, their success heavily depends upon teachers’ levels of commitment and comfort with the curriculum, as well as their perceived support from the administration; this is important and rarely studied. The current phenomenological qualitative study examined teachers’ experience during the early implementation of a new SEL, the Human Dignity Curriculum, (HDC) with middle school students in two small schools in Canada and the United States of America. Semi-structured interviews, using a four-question protocol developed for this study, were conducted with teachers who had completed teaching a 10-week module, as well as both school administrators. Written informed consent was obtained from each volunteer interviewee. Participants were asked, (1) Tell me about your experience while teaching HDC; (2) what was your commitment level to teaching HDC? (3) What was your comfort level with teaching HDC? (4) Did you feel supported by your administration when preparing and teaching HDC? Inductive thematic analysis identified five themes indicating HDC was a (1) user-friendly, (2) high value curriculum; (3) teachers felt supported teaching it; and a (4) shared language, (5) and shared teacher-student experience evolved when teaching HDC. Future research to replicate this initial evaluation of teachers’ experience and exploration of HDC’s potential impacts on youths’ well-being and related behavioral outcomes appears warranted.

Introduction

“I could see that there’s a change in the way that people view each other and treat each other. This program centers it back to we are all the same, we all struggle, we all go through things.”

-Teacher Interviewee, May 2023

Youth are distressed (Owais et al., 2022; Van Meter et al., 2023) due to a variety of reasons (Keles et al., 2020; Paul et al., 2022). Effective preventative measures for bolstering youth well-being include socioemotional learning (SEL) programs delivered in schools (Cavioni et al., 2020; Gueldner et al., 2020; Ağırkan and Ergene, 2022; Durlak et al., 2022). When implementing new curriculums, successful implementation of the program depends heavily upon teachers’ commitment to the curriculum (Rahman et al., 2019; Muliyah and Aminatun, 2020), their level of comfort with it (Ramirez et al., 2018; Margot and Kettler, 2019; Lee and Perret, 2022), as well as their perceived support from their school administration (Brackett et al., 2012). Despite the recognized importance of teachers’ expectations and beliefs about SEL, few studies examine teachers’ early implementation experience when adopting these programs (Schiepe-Tiska et al., 2021).

Socio-emotional learning curriculums

Social emotional learning occurs when individuals learn how to integrate their emotions, attitudes, and thinking into healthy identities and behaviors that support their activities of daily living and life goals (Zins, 2004). SEL curriculums have been developed to help youth gain insight into themselves and others’ behaviors (Corcoran et al., 2018), improve interpersonal skills (Durlak et al., 2022), develop social networks (Llamas-Díaz et al., 2022; Wigelsworth et al., 2022), and generate a sense of belonging (Parr et al., 2020), self-esteem (Harris and Orth, 2020), and self-efficacy (Pannebakker et al., 2019). SEL can help students socially and emotionally by giving participants specific language and shared experiences to foster self-expression (Sun et al., 2022). These skills can further serve as protective factors for future mental health outcomes, as well as reducing present struggles with aggression, emotional distress, and internalizing/externalizing problems (Portnow et al., 2018; Ağırkan and Ergene, 2022; LaBelle, 2023). As Bouffard writes in their recent article in The Learning Professional “… the need for SEL is greater than ever” (Bouffard, 2021).

Evaluation of SEL programs

Successful implementation of new SEL programs is important (Oberle et al., 2020; Akelaitis and Janiunaite, 2023). For instance, teachers may struggle with SEL programs that are rigid and inflexible and cannot be tailored to their individual classroom needs (Martínez, 2016), or teachers may experience little emotional or pragmatic support from school administration when incorporating SEL in their classroom (Durlak and DuPre, 2008). Sometimes there can be a poor fit between the SEL and the school’s mission statement/goals, or limited training for teachers before teaching the curriculum (Moldovan, 2020; McCoy and Hanno, 2023; Sooknanan, 2023). There are a variety of barriers that can arise during implementation of a new curriculum in school settings and teachers’ voices are essential in this process (Diaz-Larenas et al., 2015; Martínez, 2016; Solomon, 2016; Venné, 2022). Creating conditions that support teachers’ during the implementation of SEL programs and practices has been recognized as important (Lawson et al., 2019) and studies that report on early implementation of new SEL curriculums should be normative.

The Human Dignity Curriculum

Launched in 2017, the Human Dignity Curriculum (HDC), was developed by a team of researchers, philosophers, and educators focused on developing a curriculum that assists in the personal development of youth. The curriculum was piloted in a variety of school settings across the United States of America, Mexico, Saint Lucia, and the Philippines with full implementation in various classroom settings in Africa, Europe, Latin America, and the Middle East (Human Dignity Curriculum, 2017). Based on the key premise that all human beings share a dignity that is intrinsic, inalienable, and unconditional, students are introduced to challenging, but accessible philosophical and anthropological ideas, i.e., action follows being, humans are subjects and not objects, capacity to choose enables excellence (Etinson, 2020; Lindwall and Lohne, 2021). In HDC, students engage in a variety of active learning strategies, i.e., theater skits, to explore, understand, and express their personal understanding of concepts such as responsibility, honesty, and creativity, in their daily lives. This innovative curriculum helps students to understand their human dignity and the dignity of others are foundational components to their personal identity as they develop their own inclusive worldview (Lansdown, 2020). This curriculum has never been formally evaluated.

The purpose of the current study is to understand the experience of school administrators and teachers implementing the Human Dignity Curriculum in small school settings in North America. Teachers’ comfort, commitment, and perceived support during the early implementation of this new socioemotional learning (SEL) curriculum was explored.

Study design and data collection

This study used an explorative qualitative research design using one-on-one interviews to ascertain the experience of school administrators and teachers teaching the Human Dignity Curriculum for the first time. The methodological orientation that guided data collection was a phenomenological perspective (Patton, 2008) seeking to understand the participants’ experience and insight into teaching a new socio-emotional learning curriculum (Rahman et al., 2019). The data was collected during seven face-to-face interviews, which took place between March 1st and June 13th, 2023. Interviews were held in-person, in a private room, at the school where the interviewees worked (n = 6). One interview was conducted online, on camera, using Zoom.

Interviews were selected for data collection as they typically provide detailed, insightful, information, allowing for time and privacy necessary to increase richness and depth of recall. It also allows participants to speak more openly without fear of reprisal from colleagues, students, or administration (Krueger, 2014). The interview was guided by four main questions informed by similar research (Ee and Cheng, 2013; Martínez, 2016): (1) Tell me about your experience while teaching HDC; (2) What was your commitment level to teaching HDC? (3) What was your comfort level with teaching HDC? (4) Did you feel supported by your administration when preparing and teaching HDC?

The interview guide was reviewed to check on the clarity of wording and sequencing of questions. Interviews were conducted by one trained research assistant with an estimated 120 h of interview experience. Interviews lasted approximately five to twenty-eight minutes, with an average interview length of sixteen minutes. Demographic data of interviewees was culled from the initial interview question.

Ethics approval and consent to participate

Ethics approval was given by Saint Mary’s University Research Ethics Board (REB file#24–070). School administrators (n = 2) and all teachers (n = 5) teaching HDC in grades 6–8 during the academic 2022–2023 school year were invited to participate in these interviews; they received a study information document and a paper consent form to assist in their decision. Participants were informed they could opt out of the study at any time, or skip interview questions, without consequences. Participants did not receive any remuneration for their time spent participating in the interview. Confidentiality was assured by having all personal identifiers removed from transcriptions of interviews. Gendered language used during the interviews was neutralized, i.e., she replaced with they, to further protect the identity of participants in these small schools. Data coders had no contact with the school study sites during data collection and unique codes, e.g., C.1, instead of names were used in transcripts. Transcripts have been saved on password-protected data sticks housed in locked filing cabinets in locked offices.

Data analysis

All interviews were audio-recorded and transcribed verbatim. Transcription was completed by professional service providers. Identifying information was removed after the transcription process. The interview transcripts were independently reviewed and verified for accuracy by the research assistant that conducted all interviews. Data were analyzed using inductive thematic analysis (Braun and Clarke, 2006). Two research team members independently familiarized themselves with all the interview transcripts, generated initial codes, and searched for themes. Themes were reviewed, modified, and named. Themes were established in consultation with a third coder.

Results

“The high bar for behavior comes with teaching children what it means to be a human being, what it means to be valuable, what it means to not always thinking that the world revolves around you … [HDC] just teaches that in a very beautiful way, in a way that the children love to listen to. It’s not just a lecture, it’s the little activities that go with it. They get it. The role playing that I’ve seen them do, beautiful. Just great.”

-School Administrator, May 2023

Participant and site characteristics

Two small schools (<100) were invited to participate in this first formal evaluation of HDC (LaDuke et al., 2023). The American site was characterized as “[a place] for students who are experiencing learning struggles or behavioral problems … they are sent here to see if they can be more successful in a smaller environment.” [A.2] with small class sizes typically seven or fewer; the majority (86%) of students were male, with 100% of students having learning and/or behavioral struggles.

The small, private, faith-based, Canadian school also had fewer than 100 students which “often attracts students who have experienced adversity or struggles in other school settings.” Class size ranged from 17 to 21 students, with an even blend of male (45%) and female (55%) students. It was estimated by school administration that 40% of students in these grades have learning and/or behavioral struggles.

Seven participants (females = 3 and males = 4) with an estimated cumulative 50+ years of teaching experience participated in this study. The two school administrators (n = 2) held Bachelor of Education degrees, and all teachers (n = 5) had undergraduate degrees, with three possessing special education training. Teachers held a broad range of teaching experience ranging from 1 to 27 years. Both administrators and most teachers (n = 4) had taught a wide variety of subjects, i.e., math, music, at multiple grade levels ranging from K to 12 in both private and public-school settings. Administrators had 30+ years of cumulative experience in school administration.

Themes

Five themes were identified in the data: (1) user-friendly curriculum, (2) high value curriculum, (3) teachers felt supported during implementation, (4) shared language, and (5) shared teacher-student experience evolved as HDC was taught.

User-friendly curriculum

All the teachers (n = 5) interviewed stated they experienced a high level of comfort teaching HDC. Administrators (n = 2) agreed. “It wasn’t complicated. They’re able to just take it and implement it. I think that’s great…” [A.3] The curriculum was perceived to be focused, comprehensive, flexible, and efficient with lesson plans that contain clear directions, prompts, and engaging activities. Teachers commented that HDC was “really simple to learn, to teach, to grasp.” [C.3], “very straightforward” [A.1, C.3], “user friendly” [A.1, C.4] with “step by step direction.” [A.2] One teacher explained, “Honestly, I was very comfortable with it … the way it’s paced … even from the first lesson … anybody could teach it…” [A.2].

Flexibility in lesson plans and the variety of active learning exercises were consistently mentioned; “[I] was very impressed with the different activities that came up with each session and loved it.,” [C.2] and the “different ways to present the information … I really like that freedom…” [A.1] One administrator corroborated teachers’ experience, stating “The teachers were able to be creative, add in pieces they thought would be more relatable … they could take the activities right off the paper and implement it … it’s been successful in our building.” [A.3].

Teachers sometimes experience anxiety specific to curriculum content they may perceive as daunting, i.e., mathematical concepts (Ramirez et al., 2018). A similar dynamic may also have been present when tasked with teaching abstract constructs, i.e., dignity, however this did not appear to be the case. One teacher stated, “There wasn’t anything that I felt like I wasn’t prepared to talk about or answer questions if asked…” [C.1] A similar sentiment by A.1, “I could leave the directions with the sub, and they would be followed. It’s that simple that someone could come in and be able to read and like, “Okay, this is what I have to do.” I really enjoyed that…”

Concerns regarding the amount of content in each lesson was raised. One teacher commented “I find it’s all exciting, all good, but sometimes it can just feel like a lot.” [C.3] one of the administrators also noted, “Sometimes [the teachers] would not get to certain things that were on the timeline ….” [A.3].

High value curriculum

Successful implementation of curriculum heavily depends on the attitudes of the educators teaching the material (Martínez, 2016; Kim and Hong, 2019). Teachers were asked how they felt about HDC before they began teaching and after completing a 10-week HDC module in their classroom.

Initial reaction to HDC

All teachers interviewed (n = 5) recalled feeling positive about HDC before teaching it. “I think from the very start, everyone was very impressed and excited…” [C.3] For instance, C.4 recalled “I thought it was a good initiative.” and many teachers expressed similar sentiments. “I was feeling fairly committed [before I began], I was familiar enough with the curriculum to see its value and its importance … I was excited.” [C.1] Likewise, “My first impression of HDC was it was a really exciting curriculum. I like the way it uses language in an intentional way … [I was] happy to try it and see how it worked.” [C.3] Another teacher said, “I was comfortable with it. A little apprehensive before we got it in our hands. But once I got it, it’s just figuring out how I wanted to do it and present the information…” [A.1].

Both administrators held strong positive attitudes toward HDC before implementing it in their schools. “I loved the idea of it, and I knew it fit right.” [C.2] and “… I felt like this was going to be a good program, so it was important for us, to pick those teachers that we knew were going to be energetic about it and really wanted to teach it and put their all into it…” [A.3].

Post-program delivery attitudes

After HDC was taught, administrators were still very positive stating they “absolutely love it” [C.2] and “… in full support of them doing it next year. ‘[A.3] and had already recommended HDC to other schools and community groups [A.3, C.2]. Teachers (n = 5) stated teaching HDC “was really positive [C.3] … super easy to do … simple compared to how much time it takes [C.4] … worth it.” [C.4, C.1]. “I would recommend this to everyone … hopefully, we keep using it…” [A.1] “I think it’s a great program … it’s valuable … it’s well worth it for kids, for teachers, for everyone to be adopting this language ….” [C.3]. When asked if they would recommend HDC to other teachers all teachers said “yes” (n = 5).

Teachers felt supported during implementation

All teachers reported feeling supported by their principals as they taught HDC (n = 5). This support was noted in a threefold manner. Firstly, one teacher explained, the administrators “Actually, they did a lot by not doing a lot, if that makes sense. Just their positivity and their willingness to accept whatever we were doing…” [A.2] Another teacher said, “We would tell them things that we were doing, and they’d get excited. They trusted us, and they knew we would use it in a way that would be beneficial to the children. So, yeah, support, 100%…” [A.1] Secondly, administrators actively supported teachers during HDC lessons. For instance, the administrator was present and said, “Go on, take more time. I can see that they are excited about what’s going on ….” [C.2] Another teacher said, “My principal on more than one occasion, asked “Oh, can I say something?” and wanted to define something or highlight something … it gets you excited … HDC elicits that type of response…” [C.3] Thirdly, school administrators supported teachers by reinforcing HDC topics when interacting with students outside the classroom. For example, “Our [administrator] will even bring it [HDC] up …, “Oh, [your teacher] has been telling me what you guys have been doing…” [A.2] Support from the curriculum provider [C.1, A.1, C.4] and the school district [A.2] was also noted.

Shared language evolved

When asked about their experience teaching HDC, teachers reflected on how this curriculum has facilitated communication with their students. They noticed a common lexicon emerging, “I feel like there is increased understanding because of HDC, we are now all speaking the same language … they are understanding me clearly.” [C.3] Teachers repeatedly (n = 5) reported the language introduced in HDC was useful for addressing positive and negative student behaviors. “The curriculum’s been very useful … like when I say, “You’re not really treating that person with dignity.” students know exactly what you mean, instead of, “Oh, you are bullying them, or you are being mean to them.” which can mean so many things.” [C.4] Another teacher, also indicated the value of HDC language when disciplining students “I bring kids in the hallway and I talk with them and say, “Was that an excellent choice?.” [C.3, C.2] The language of HDC was also helpful for affirming positive behaviors, “You just made them feel like an amazing human being by what you did.,” [C.1] and helping students envision prosocial behaviors, “Is this how friends act?” [C.3].

Shared teacher-student experience evolved

Many teachers shared how they were personally benefiting from teaching HDC. “I enjoyed teaching it because I could relate to it just as much as the students. I got to think about these things in a new way. I think the students took away a lot of this, and myself.” [C.4] Another teacher noticed similar changes in their word choice, “I guess I can hear it in my own language … it seems to be something that permeates the students and myself…,” [C.3] as another teacher admitted, “I think I’ve changed [from teaching HDC]…” [A.1].

Teachers also noted that teaching the curriculum necessitated self-reflection, honesty, and authenticity, telling students “You get to learn more about yourself as a person and myself as well. This is going to open us both up. We’re going to learn things about each other … and do not think these are something that just young people do, no…” [A.2].

Teachers noted that once the language of HDC was understood and assimilated it permeated more than the daily lesson, “It [HDC] seems to permeate all of our discussions. It’s something that we have… and it can exist in any discussion or any topic that we talk about…” [C.3] Another teacher also referred specifically to the discussions, stating, “the discussions, actually, were really some of my favorite ….” [A.1].

Discussion

“I think just bringing it all back to the respect piece, that everybody deserves respect no matter who they are, no matter where that they’re at, and what station they are in life.”

-School Administrator, 2023

All administrators and teachers interviewed (n = 7) conveyed support for the Human Dignity Curriculum (HDC) before and after adopting the curriculum. They endorsed HDC characterizing it as “straightforward,” [A.1, C.3] “simple to learn and to teach and to grasp,” [C.3] “easy to implement,” [C.2] with well organized, teacher-friendly lesson plans that contain clear directions, prompts, and highly engaging activities. Teachers [C.1, A.2, C.4, A.1] repeatedly noted the flexibility in lesson plans that allowed for inclusion of resources they were more familiar with from previous teaching and the freedom to choose active learning exercises best suited for their students. This is important as previous research on SELs have identified rigidity of curriculum to be a common barrier to effective program implementation (Moldovan, 2020; Oberle et al., 2020). Teachers’ initial attitudes toward the Human Dignity Curriculum were positive. The receptivity of teachers delivering programs is important (Lendrum et al., 2016) and likely contributed to the successful implementation of HDC (Martínez, 2016).

Despite the widespread approval for HDC throughout the interviews, the feedback from one teacher warrants further exploration in future evaluations/studies. This teacher [C.3] repeatedly stated they “wish we had more time” and often made decisions to “scratch that” when engaging daily lesson plans. A school administrator [A.3] confirmed teachers in their school were not always reaching intended milestones that could reflect the flexibility inherent in the curriculum, however, it could also indicate there is too much content in some lessons. If left unchecked, educators consistently dropping material from lessons could potentially compromise the integrity of the HDC program. Degradation of excellent programs is not uncommon and needs to be carefully guarded against with diligent maintenance of a program once implemented (Chen, 2005). The curriculum provider may want to consider developing an implement, i.e., checkboxes on lesson plans, that would allow teachers, administrators, and evaluators to track material engaged to inform future revisions of HDC. This modification would also allow for a more accurate assessment of the program “dosage” being delivered (Durlak and DuPre, 2008; Reynolds et al., 2011; Kuhn and Marvin, 2016). Future studies investigating HDC might also consider measuring “multiform dosage” that include incorporating non-lesson-based strategies to incorporate SEL materials in the school day such as modeling desired behavioral outcomes during routine interactions with students, incorporating HDC material in other non-SEL classes/lessons, i.e., literature studies, and integrating SEL content into students’ interactions throughout the day (Devlin et al., 2023; Lee et al., 2023). These efforts would also contribute to a wider school-based implementation desired by teachers and administrators interviewed. [C.2, A.3, C.1, C.3].

Feedback during interviews indicated teachers felt highly supported by both administrators and the curriculum providers. Again, this is indicative of a successful implementation of program (Sooknanan, 2023) and potential positive outcomes for students (Akelaitis and Janiunaite, 2023). Data from the teacher interviews identified three distinct ways administrators supported the implementation of HDC; by (1) championing their efforts in “doing nothing,” (2) confirming teachers’ efforts when encountering students in hallways/schoolwide assemblies, and (3) dropping into classrooms when HDC was being taught. All three of these types of support reported by the teachers have been cited in the literature as part of effective administration practice (Grissom et al., 2021; Stronge and Xu, 2021).

The Human Dignity Curriculum demonstrated a “strong fit” with two small schools in North America, one public school servicing at-risk youth and a private school with a faith-based directive. The fact HDC was well received, successfully implemented, and enjoyed by staff in both settings increases the generalizability of the current study’s findings. HDC works “very well” [A.3] with students struggling with behavioral/learning difficulties, as well as those who do not share those difficulties. Future evaluations of HDC should consider including other types of school and community settings (Hurd and Deutsch, 2017; Chu and DeArmond, 2021).

Limitations and strengths

The sample in this study is small and idiosyncratic (n = 7); therefore, the generalizability of the current study’s findings to similar or dissimilar schools is unknown. Further, due to the limited number of interviews conducted it is possible code saturation was not achieved (Hennink et al., 2019) thereby warranting more investigation. It should also be noted that one of the school administrators chose teachers they “knew were going to be energetic about it and really wanted to teach it” [A.3] thus it is unknown if similar results would have been obtained if those teachers had not been selected by their principal.

Strengths of the current study, include the diversity of interviewees included both males (n = 4) and females (n = 3), and four of the five teachers interviewed had 10 or more years of teaching experience. Further, participants were not a self-selected group; in which case concerns that those who did not enjoy teaching HDC opted out of the study. All teachers that taught HDC in their middle school (n = 5) accepted the invitation to interview; participants did not receive any remuneration for their time spent participating in the interview. Members of the research team conducting data coding did not have any personal contact with interviewees. Finally, HDC was successfully implemented in both a private and public-school setting each with a different mission and mandate, suggesting these findings may generalize to other school settings.

Implications for practice and research

The shared language and experience students and teachers developed with HDC was notable and may hold potential in addressing broader social issues involving conflict and social upheaval. HDC facilitated communication between teachers and students and may hold implications for increasing teacher wellness as well as for students (Sandilos et al., 2023). Typical SEL impacts, i.e., empathy, coupled with the HDC lexicon that recognizes a universal shared humanity may deserve investigation examining secondary impacts on attitudes related to bullying and interpersonal violence (Nickerson et al., 2019), prejudicial attitudes toward newcomers (Crooks et al., 2022), and stigmatization of underserved groups (Wittlin et al., 2023).

Conclusion

Teachers perceived HDC to be a well-crafted, high-value, user-friendly, flexible, socio-emotional learning curriculum with a variety of engaging active learning options for each lesson. Implementing HDC generated a common language to communicate about negative, e.g., school infractions, and positive, e.g., personal growth, behaviors in students. Teachers felt they were personally and positively impacted by teaching HDC. Teachers felt supported throughout the delivery of HDC, and administrators felt it was a strong fit with their school setting. All interviewees stated they would highly recommend HDC to another teacher or school. This novel SEL curriculum warrants further investigation.

Data availability statement

The original contributions presented in the study are included in the article/supplementary material, further inquiries can be directed to the corresponding author.

Ethics statement

The studies involving humans were approved by the St. Mary’s University, SMU REB File #24–070. The studies were conducted in accordance with the local legislation and institutional requirements. The participants provided their written informed consent to participate in this study.

Author contributions

ML: Conceptualization, Writing – original draft, Formal analysis.

Funding

The author(s) declare that no financial support was received for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Acknowledgments

The author wishes to thank the interview participants who generously gave their time after a full and exhausting day in their classrooms, the research assistants for conducting interviews and their meticulous, excruciating detailed coding of the data.

Conflict of interest

The author declares that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.

Publisher’s note

All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article, or claim that may be made by its manufacturer, is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.

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Keywords: socio-emotional learning, curriculum, teacher, perception, experience, implementation, early evaluation

Citation: Law MA (2024) Human Dignity Curriculum: Teachers’ comfort, commitment, and perceived support teaching a new socioemotional learning curriculum. Front. Educ. 9:1427079. doi: 10.3389/feduc.2024.1427079

Received: 02 May 2024; Accepted: 24 July 2024;
Published: 01 August 2024.

Edited by:

Matthias Ziegler, Humboldt University of Berlin, Germany

Reviewed by:

Kesh Mohangi, University of South Africa, South Africa
Marina Kovacevic Lepojevic, University of Belgrade, Serbia

Copyright © 2024 Law. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

*Correspondence: Moira A. Law, moira.law@smu.ca

†ORCID: Moira A. Law, https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4797-7807

Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.

View it on Frontiers:  https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/education/articles/10.3389/feduc.2024.1427079/full?field&journalName=Frontiers_in_Education&id=1427079

Antique, Philippines Adopts the Human Dignity Curriculum

If we want a more just world, we must start with our children.

That’s the message of the Human Dignity Curriculum (HDC). The curriculum teaches children a fundamental reality: we are all equal in dignity. And because of this dignity, all human beings are worthy of respect. When children understand this, it’s the first step towards a future of freedom and justice.

For the past few years, HDC has been spreading to classrooms around the world, from Kenya and Lebanon to Paraguay and the United States. Wherever the curriculum is taught, it brings hope to children and families and transforms lives.

Take the Philippines.

On March 18, 2024, the Province of Antique, Philippines adopted a provincial ordinance institutionalizing the Human Dignity Curriculum in all public and private schools. The provincial ordinance was sponsored by Antique Board Member Dr. Mayella Mae Plameras-Ladislao and signed into law by Antique Governor Rhodora J. Cadiao on March 27.

The statute is entitled An Ordinance Empowering Children, Adolescents and Youth Through Enactment of the Human Dignity Education Program in the Province of Antique. It aims to recognize the importance of instilling values such as respect, empathy, and kindness in educational institutions.

“Through the provincial HDC ordinance, we hope to equip future generations to value human dignity and foster a deep sense of meaning and purpose among our learners,” says Dr. Plameras-Ladislo.

A New Pilot Program

Sta. Rita Academy—a private K-6 Catholic school in the town of Sibalom—was the first school in Antique to pilot the Human Dignity Curriculum.

Fifth-grade teacher Honey Rose Sumugat led her students through the curriculum. Using games, discussion, and activities, the class learned that we are all equal in dignity and that no one, and no action, can take away a person’s inherent dignity. Students discussed the importance of kindness, love, and friendship, and treating people as subjects rather than objects.

Students particularly loved a section of the program where they were asked to write an acrostic poem expressing what made them special or what it’s like to be a human. The activity gave the kids a profound way to express their feelings about their families.

Ms. Honey Rose has been amazed by the transformation she’s seen in her students. Proud and boastful pupils have become humble and appreciative of their self-worth. Rambunctious kids show more respect, obedience, and responsibility.

“I now begin to see some changes in the attitude of the students and how they treat one another and other people because of the Human Dignity Curriculum. They are able to readily accept failures, to have a more positive attitude, to try their best to be better and to nurture hope in their heart,” Ms. Honey Rose shares.

Sta. Rita students Thea and Julienne agree that the HDC has been life-changing. Thea said that the program helped her peers realize the importance of considering others, not just themselves.

Students are also growing in confidence and perseverance. One child shared, “I learned that we can learn from our mistakes and we can choose to be better.”

Another fifth-grader told Ms. Honey Rose, “Miss, thank you for making me realize my mistakes and helping me to let go of the grudges in my heart. I will now understand and obey my parents because what they are doing is for my own good.”

Sta. Rita Academy—a private K-6 Catholic school in the town of Sibalom—was the first school in Antique to pilot the Human Dignity Curriculum.

Changing Lives Outside the Classroom

The curriculum has created a ripple effect in the Sta. Rita community. Parents of some of the students were excited to share the changes happening in the behavior of their children. They’ve reported their kids becoming more humble, obedient, considerate towards siblings, and respectful. 

Ms. Honey Rose recounts a particularly moving story: “There was one parent who came to me teary-eyed and told me that her child repeatedly tells her: ‘Mama, thank you for your hard work. I love you!’ She was so touched, she couldn’t believe such a transformation was happening in her child.” 

Inspired by the stories and lessons that their kids brought home from the HDC classroom, many parents have changed their lives, too. Some have shared that they’ve become more affectionate and attentive towards their kids. 

Even Ms. Honey Rose’s own outlook on life has changed.  She’s found herself practicing the curriculum’s principles more in her daily life. “I feel fulfilled seeing the learners gradually learning and changing,” she says. 

Sta. Rita Academy is just the beginning. Thanks to the recently-passed provincial ordinance, HDC Teacher Training in Antique is scheduled for the coming year. And the curriculum will be piloted in select public schools in Libertad and Sebaste this September. HDC now has the potential to reach over 500 schools and over a hundred thousand students all over the province. The future of HDC in the Philippines is bright!

Want to learn more about the HDC? Visit our curriculum page or send us an email at hdc@wya.net.

“It changed everything:” Bringing the Human Dignity Curriculum to a Cameroon school

For the last three months, Jervis Lyonga has been commuting to Bishop Rogan College, an all-boys school in Cameroon, to volunteer teach the Human Dignity Curriculum (HDC).

“The trip is only fifteen minutes,” he says modestly, before eventually admitting that “the roads are not the best, given the security challenges . . . and the rainy season . . . but if you’re lucky enough to get a taxi . . .” He typically leaves his home around 8am to be on time for his 11am class.

Jervis sits quietly in front of a wall of books. He’s a student himself, pursuing his master’s degree in conflict resolution, international law and human rights. His country is in a state of unrest, with violent clashes between separatists and the Cameroonian security forces.

“I don’t know how to describe the root causes, but there’s a lot of regional inequality in the two English regions as compared with the French. You don’t know what is going to happen. You don’t know who is responsible. You don’t know if you’re safe. But presently I would say it’s relatively calm especially in the educational sector, as opposed to when it started in 2016.”

Jervis joined World Youth Alliance in 2021. He completed the Certified Training Program (CTP), becoming a trainer of other members both regionally and globally, before doing the Advocacy Academy during an internship with the regional office in Nairobi. “I had HDC in mind as a way to give back to my community. I wanted to do more.”

It takes the right place and the right principal to implement the Human Dignity Curriculum. Jervis found both at Bishop Rogan College: “Initially the principal wanted me to teach HDC to the whole school, but due to scheduling, I ended up teaching just 40 students. The first day was . . .” he exhales and smiles. “I wrote human dignity on the board and asked students to simply raise their hand if they had human dignity, were important and loved.” Only five students raised their hands.

“I was a little bit shocked,” Jervis admits. “But this one question got the class moving.” At the end of the lesson the students assigned themselves homework: “They wanted to write about their personal purpose, in reaction to the question of personal importance.”

In lesson two, there was silence when Jervis read the definition of treating persons as objects aloud: “using persons for personal pleasure or benefit.” “They knew what it meant,” he says, “They were real philosophers about it.”

Jervis led his class in discussing Martin Buber’s classic text, I and Thou. “We discussed questions that tied deeply to their day to day lives. HDC bridges that connection between what they have inside of them and what their expectations are for themselves. I think because it’s the one academic class that’s ‘all about you,’ the HDC fits well into their daily lives and students share their feelings.”

But it was the lesson on Freedom that really changed the tone in the classroom.

Jervis asked the students if they thought they had freedom. They did not think they did. “We discussed the freedom to be here at this school or this choice or that to break rules . . . We discussed this for a long time.” Then, after reading Viktor Frankl, “about how everything can be taken away from you, and yet in that moment being able to somehow decide your attitude . . . It changed everything,” Jervis says. “Their approach to things was different after that.”

By week five, students would be looking for Jervis in the halls. “They were like, where were you? When are you coming back to school? I said, don’t worry, I told you I’ll be back! They loved it. Every day they were following up, asking questions from the previous lessons.”

Jervis included Frank Sinatra’s “My Way” song in the lesson on The Power of Art, to further the discussion: “I said listen to the lyrics, what does it say about freedom? Is it freedom for excellence or indifference?” The Human Dignity Curriculum had given these high school students a vocabulary for thinking philosophically about their lives and the world we inhabit.

He created quizzes and evaluations so that the students would take the material seriously, since there is no formal grading for HDC. “It was a rich experience for the students, as they were really making connections between what they were learning in other classes and these deeper questions in the HDC.”

Before leaving for Christmas break, the students received their HDC graduation certificates in a closing ceremony in the school auditorium, attended by teachers and parents. If class scheduling permits, the hope is that in the new year, the juniors at Bishop Rogan College will start HDC next.

“People think that human dignity is the same as human rights. But it isn’t. Human dignity is the basis for human rights,” says Jervis. And so, the Human Dignity Curriculum helps students learn something about themselves. As for his personal experience, “I’ve learned a lot,” he says. “All of this has changed my scope. And I think for me, my field of studies is not unrelated—it has helped me a lot in terms of my personal development.”

For Jervis and his students, that development is well worth the three-hour commute and extra class.

Mirrors and Windows: What Does it Mean to be Human?

A Window into the Human Person

At times, a student’s learning in a classroom can be a window; an opportunity to see both nuance and novelty in the world, an opportunity to examine the range of what it means to be human.

At other times, a student’s learning can serve as a mirror; a chance to see the self in a book, in a discussion, in the experiences of a classmate. In this reflection—perhaps magnified, perhaps distorted—students might see aspects of themselves previously unknown or unexamined.

Our research on the Human Dignity Curriculum—an ongoing mixed-methods study conducted by the University of Florida, St. Mary’s University, and the World Youth Alliance—has illuminated both mirrors and windows in students’ experiences learning about human dignity.

What is the Human Dignity Curriculum?

What is Human Dignity?

In the spring of 2023, we interviewed nearly 60 students with the hopes of understanding their perspectives on and experiences with human dignity after participating in the HDC. 

Students described learning about the nature of subjects versus objects, the value of different types of friendships, and the ability to think and choose and act with agency, amongst other topics.

Ashley, a sixth grader, spoke about seeing what it means to be human and herself in a new way. She told us:

“I’ve been having more confidence in what I do and just not really caring about what the other people say and stuff. Probably just that everything that you do in life is okay. And that if you make a mistake, that is fine. You can just try again.”

The HDC reflects the perspective that human dignity is something inherent and irrevocable. As such, it makes sense that Ashley feels confident, knowing that “if you make a mistake, that is fine.”

Download a free lesson plan.

We can teach students what it means to be human by teaching them human dignity.

Another student, George, talked about how the HDC changed his views on and treatment of others. The fifth-grader told us that

“everybody has dignity, so it’s not okay to bully other people because they also have human dignity.”

What it Means to be Human is to Have Infinite Dignity

Another student, Benny, marveled that “even a criminal [has] human dignity that’s equal with every other person.”

Lily, a seventh-grader, shared a similar perspective. When we asked her about a major takeaway from the HDC, she told us how:

“…everyone has human dignity and it’s important to treat everyone the same, even if you don’t like someone as much…so that they know that the other person has feelings too, and they know that if you hurt their feelings, they’re going to feel bad about it, and they might do the same to someone else.”

The Human Dignity Curriculum 

The HDC offers students the answer to what it means to be human and a window into what’s truly inside another person.

Not surprisingly, the students we interviewed described changes in their views of family members, classmates and even their teachers.

The HDC also offers the chance to see what’s inside each of us.

Isabel, an eighth grader, identified this essential thing as human dignity, reminding us that “I have human dignity, and I shouldn’t treat myself like I don’t.”

Students have questions. The answer is human dignity. Learn more about the curriculum.

 

Kids who Bully and Kids who Get Bullied Learn “¡Soy Digno!”

Why do Kids Bully?

Keep that question in your mind. Before I tell the story of bullying and how it stopped, let’s back up.

Roció Valdez lives in a small town in Paraguay.

There are five schools in the town and she approached each of them to tell them about the Human Dignity Curriculum (HDC). Of these, one gave her permission to present the HDC to the Director of the School and its teachers.

She received permission to teach the HDC to the grade three students and then the pandemic hit.

“At first, students were sent home and school activities were canceled. Then, despite the fact that the school was not allowed to do in-person instruction, the students were told they could go to school on Tuesday and Thursdays to do the HDC.”

I ask Roció what it was like, teaching a room full of grade three students, in masks, in an empty building?

“The reaction of the kids was really great; they were excited about going to the school for a special class and they never missed a class because of how excited they were. We didn’t do certain games or activities in the lesson plan in order to follow the rules regarding social distancing.”

Kids Getting Bullied is Nothing New

At one point, Roció noticed a couple of students bullying another student.

“They were making fun of her because of her skin color.”

“They called her quemadita which means burned.”

“I told the kids not to say this, but they wouldn’t listen.

Then, when we talked about the value of human dignity and that we have human dignity even when we have differences, by the end of that lesson, the tone in the room had changed and the students were noticeably more collaborative.”

Why do kids bully? Because they don't know that they and others have human dignity.

Students hold signs from the curriculum that read: “I have the power to think and choose” and “I am worthy.”

A Hunger for Human Dignity

Fast forward to 2023, when the same school asked Roció to teach the HDC to the grade four students.

“Post-pandemic, students across Paraguay are experiencing increased difficulty with reading and writing.” Due to the popularity of the program, the school gave the HDC a two-hour time slot, from 9-11am every Tuesday and Thursday.

At first, the teachers gave a lot of homework to students to make up for the time lost to the HDC class. However, since the HDC class was only for one month, the kids were still happy because all they wanted was the HDC and so they didn’t care about other homework.”

Despite the generous two-hour time slot, the HDC class would still sometimes run for three hours, because “the kids would skip their break and eat in the classroom to keep going,” said Roció. “We covered a lot of material quickly!”

When Roció missed a class because she was sick, the following class, the kids were sad and angry with her.

“One kid asked me, why, why, weren’t you there? And then the students told me not to miss another one.”

Bullying Comes from Ignorance of Human Dignity

Remember the question, why do kids bully? The HDC covers a lot of important ideas that kids don’t usually get to talk about in school. “The questions are interesting and deep… so, kids are allowed to show their feelings and be sincere. They like it.”

“There is a lot of poverty, and many of these children are living in a situation where both their parents have left the country to try to find work.

In these families, the kids are taking care of their grandparents. Most kids are sensitive to the topic and don’t want to talk about their parents at all.”

In the lesson on Heroism, the heroes the fourth-grade students selected were their grandparents, their teachers and Roció.

At the end of the class, one student told Rocio that thanks to her, he knows he has value.

I ask Rocio if the kids are surprised to learn that they have human dignity? There is a pause. She is crying.

“Yes. Of course. At the end of the curriculum, all of the kids cried that the classes were over.”

“HDC gives them back an identity.”

Because, in the end, the kids understood what human dignity is and that they were really valued. And it made them so happy.”

Listen to educators talk about the Human Dignity Curriculum!

Little House, Big House (Nyumba Ndogo, Nyumba Kubwa)

Kisumu Juvenile Remand Home is a place where children in conflict with the law are committed by court until their matters are finalized. Some are orphans, others are from situations of neglect, living on the street.

At the Remand Home, they are safe, they have accommodation and food, and now they also know that their human dignity is intrinsic and can’t be given or taken away.

Beginning in April, every other Tuesday, the young people of Kisumu Remand home would gather in small groups, or, little house “Nyumba Ndogo” and big house “Nyumba Kubwa”, to take the Human Dignity Curriculum (HDC), taught by a facilitator.

“Some of these children haven’t been in school for quite some time, and so, based on their level of literacy, they received instruction from either the Kindergarten or Grade 7 level of the Human Dignity Curriculum (HDC),” explains Cynthia Maingi, Director of World Youth Alliance Africa, the organization behind the program.

“They come into this place that is safe, they find themselves among other children and encounter adults who care about them. As a result, they build rapport quickly with the facilitators. Whether it’s a week or three months, sometimes… the facilitators know it’s a limited time to impact this person’s life.”

The homes make do with what little resources they have.

The cost of the Human Dignity Curriculum was covered by World Youth Alliance, but facilitators translated each lesson into Swahili for delivery to the children.

To meet the challenges of the low literacy level, they got creative, bringing salt, lemons and sugar into the room to explain the idea of the human senses.

Gathering plants from outside, they explained the lesson on the Hierarchy of Being, highlighting the powers that plants, animals and humans share, and the two powers that are unique to humans: the power to think and the power to choose.

Most children’s homes in Kenya try to implement programs aimed at teaching life skills, such as financial literacy or dealing with issues of peer pressure.

“Of the partners we’ve worked with…” begins Cynthia, before re-stating:

“ALL of the partners we have worked with, say that what stands out for them is that the Human Dignity Curriculum starts with the question: who am I?” 

For the children of Kisumu Juvenile Remand Home, they may think the answer to that question is confusing, embarrassing, or worse.

“Yes, many of the children feel they’ve been rescued from situations that are so unbearable,” says Cynthia, who has worked with various children’s homes in Nairobi.

Learn more about this K-12 curriculum that changes lives!

“HDC teaches children  that even if you’re going to this Remand Home, that doesn’t negate the fact that you have the same value as every other person.”

At the end of one of the lessons in the Grade 7 Curriculum, the lesson concludes with a True or False quiz that rings true to the images capturing HDC scholars diligently at work, residents of the Kisumu Juvenile Remand Home:

“Society does not give us human dignity; every human being has dignity, whether society recognizes it or not.” True.

“If we live in difficult circumstances with a lot of distress, we still have human dignity.” True.

Explore the curriculum in depth and contact us!

Human Dignity Heals Memory and Identity

The Effects of Divorce on Human Dignity

Isabel waits patiently in the hallway, as I’m still interviewing Jack. “We’ll be just a few more minutes I say” and she eagerly nods her head and closes the door.

Jack returns to the discussion of his sister and how difficult she is to love; and yet, he says, “I can’t hate her. It’s a disability in me.”

He tells me about how angry he is; he asks if it’s normal to feel physically sick with so much anger inside.

He tells me that he has seen his sister harm herself:

“I see how beautiful she is, but she doesn’t. I know she has human dignity, but she doesn’t know it. She doesn’t go to this school and so she doesn’t take classes in the Human Dignity Curriculum.”

Why this curriculum gives us hope.

The Effects of Divorce on the Home

Isabel is interviewed next; she says that her younger sister doesn’t know what human dignity is: she pushes people and calls them names.

Isabel doesn’t retaliate anymore though, as she tries to respect her sister’s dignity.

“Has the human dignity curriculum changed the way you behave at home,” I ask?

“Yes. I get along better with my Mom now. We used to fight all the time, ever since the divorce. I’m really close with my Dad. Then I realized that my Mom has dignity, too. And so I comfort her when she is sad and she comforts me, too.”

A mere three months ago, Isabel said she was unable to talk to her Mom. Her schoolwork was slipping as she was tossed back and forth between two homes.

“After the divorce, I forgot a lot of things,” she says. “The lesson on thinking and choosing helped her remember things.” “Why do you think that is?” I ask. “I can’t explain it, it just did.”

The answer to questions kids have and the challenges they face.

Reversing the Effects of Divorce on Children

The effects of divorce on children are devastating. As novelist Pat Conroy wrote, “each divorce is the death of a civilization.” But as civilizations fall, they can also be rebuilt.

With HDC, that process begins within each student.

To understand human dignity is what the children of divorce really need.        

When I first met Jarvis, he slouched in to the interview with dirty nails and long hair hiding most of his face. He wasn’t interested in my questions and generally dismissed their relevance to his life with a shrug.

Today, he says “hello” when he enters the room, his hair is pulled back from his face and his nails are short and clean.

When I ask if the human dignity class has changed him at all, he says, “oh, definitely.” If actions speak louder than words, as our interview is over, he thanks me for having taken the time to interview him.

What does it mean to be human?

Human Dignity is Critical to Education

The Human Dignity Curriculum is being evaluated by researchers at the University of Florida for its impact on Social and Emotional Learning (SEL).

The evaluation is taking place in two sites across North America, one in a public school in Kansas and a private school in New Brunswick.

Students in Grades 5-8 in both sites were interviewed, as well as their teachers, to gauge the impact of the curriculum on self-perception and pro-social behaviors.

Download free sample lessons from the human dignity curriculum here.

To protect the privacy of students, all names were changed for this article.

The HDC is Our Hope

The Human Dignity Curriculum (HDC), developed by the World Youth Alliance, teaches young people ages 4-18 about the value of the human person, the power to think and to choose, to treat persons as subjects and not objects and to use their freedom for human excellence. It sounds like a tall order, but students are hungry for big ideas that capture their imagination and their heart.

“The HDC is hope,” said Rocio Valdez, an HDC coordinator, who brought the HDC to students in a small town in Paraguay, in the midst of the COVID pandemic. “I think it’s important to teach kids that life is worth it and that their dignity is a given, regardless of the situations they find themselves in. Even if that situation is illness, vulnerability or feeling small.”

Growing in the awareness of their intrinsic value, students begin to see themselves as protagonists in their own education and story. One of the ways the HDC does this is through showcasing the stories and struggles of others. “The stories in the HDC really inspire the students to see that other people have gone through difficult things, too. What makes them a hero is that they chose to do the right thing even when it was hard.”

The HDC provides students with the framework to understand being and becoming. In simple terms: that they are a person with human dignity and that they have the capacity to pursue human excellence. And that to be a hero is as straightforward as to choose what is excellent.

There was one student who was very shy and rarely spoke in class. Rocio could tell that this student didn’t feel able to express herself or share her opinion in class. “In this one lesson, we discussed choosing between the hard but excellent choice and the easy but not-so-excellent choice. At the end of the class, this little girl shared with me that it was inspiring to learn that she could make good decisions for all aspects of her life. She was shocked. She said she had never thought that she had dignity, and so she didn’t know that she could make good choices.”

Rocio can only marvel at the changes in that student: “I will never forget watching her at the
end of the course–that jumping, smiling girl was changed–and that was amazing to see. Teaching young people to love themselves and to love others is what the HDC does.”

Paraguayan Students on the HDC’s Homebound Heroism

“When I get home, I tell my Mom everything I have learned,” shared one HDC student from the Escuela Publica Defensores del Chaco, in Paraguay. Another student agreed, saying that she shares her lessons with her grandmother, so that she can learn about her human dignity, too. This effort is the result of a group of young leaders from the World Youth Alliance who volunteer to teach the Human Dignity Curriculumin the local school.

“I decided to get involved as a HDC teacher because I believe it is important to train children on….seeking respect for the human person and their dignity as they are pillars in individual life,” said one WYA volunteer.

The HDC’s unique approach to teaching dignity education enables students to think deeply about what it means to be a human person. Teaching students about the pursuit of human excellence redefines their understanding of what they are capable of and what it means to be a hero.

This particular implementation of HDC was its own testament to heroism. Despite the challenges brought about by the pandemic, the HDC team in Paraguay was able to teach HDC through a hybrid setup of virtual and in person classes. “We thought they were not going to be able to adapt but it was the opposite. Since I arrived, it has been a success in the institution,” shared Teacher Delma Barreto, an educator at the school.

The team of WYA volunteers witnessed how the weekly lessons began to make an impact in the students’ lives, as they would hear from parents about what was happening even at home. Parents expressed their surprise at the behavioral change they saw. One parent said, “My daughter misbehaved and used bad words, but with these lessons, she changed her behavior. She feels more content and happy to be who she is.”

Another parent shared that he didn’t know anything about human dignity until the HDC: “I thought it was a normal course where they were going to learn writing or something. My son told me that he wanted to participate and when he told me what he learned, I liked it more.”

Students were also able to relate the lessons to the challenges they were facing in school – particularly in bullying. “Some children said they suffered from bullying and now with the help of the program, they have overcame their fears. They have learned to respect and love themselves. The HDC has inspired them and made them happier,” shared one teacher, Ms. Delma.