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Street Law / Newsroom / Teleconference brings Lithuanian students to Springfield, VA classroom

Teleconference brings Lithuanian students to Springfield, VA classroom

Teleconference brings Lithuanian students to Springfield, VA classroom

Vilnius, Lithuania

Approximately eighty students from three Northern Virginia high schools congregated at Robert E. Lee High School in Springfield, VA, to participate in an international teleconference with students in Vilnius, Lithuania.  Students took turns asking and answering questions that ranged in theme from government and democracy to personal interests and hobbies.  Street Law, Inc. assisted in the development and execution of the teleconference as part of the Deliberating in Democracy (DID) program. The U.S. Embassy in Lithuania hosted the students in Vilnius and provided significant technological and logistical support.

The 90-minute visit in late October helped establish introductory relationships among students who will continue to communicate through the DID program in the coming months, deliberating on controversial policy issues about law, democracy, and human rights.  The program is designed to teach students to consider various points of view on relevant civic issues with an international perspective.  Deliberation topics will include juvenile justice, cyberbullying, youth curfews, and freedom of expression.  

While the students did not engage in a deliberation in the October videoconference, they learned valuable information from political, social, and economic comparisons of their countries, which will serve to better equip them for the deliberations to come.  The teleconference was also a foreign language exercise for the Lithuanian students, as they communicated their ideas in clear English.  The participating teachers in both countries are currently in the process of creating a Facebook community for their students, so that they can connect on a social level.   

DID is a collaborative program of Street Law, Inc., Constitutional Rights Foundation, and Constitutional Rights Foundation Chicago.  Funding is provided by the United States Department of Education’s Civic Education Program in the Office of Safe and Drug-Free Schools.  To learn more about the project or to view the lesson plans, please go to www.deliberating.org 

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Deliberating in a Democracy

Topic: Civic & Law-Related Education

Topic: Democracy/Human Rights

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