This year, a good 2,000 visitors attended the “Education Weeks Against Racism” and they also received the most votes in the public vote. This shows that the months of preparation by the 15-strong volunteer team are paying off. There is a need. In September, the organizing team – the “Education Working Group” in the Halle Alliance Against the Right – met for the first meeting and agreed on a motto for this year’s education weeks. It is: “Rights for all, instead of everyone to the right.”
A total of 40 events, from exhibitions to workshops and lectures to films and concerts, repeatedly addressed one question: How can we live together peacefully without racism?
The members of the volunteer organization team have invested up to ten hours a week in preparation. Amelie Basan, the coordinator of the educational weeks against racism and the only full-time member of the organization team, emphasizes: “Without the volunteers, the whole thing would not work at all.” Two of them are Sarah Sisouphantavong, the 28-year-old works for the umbrella organization of migrant organizations (Damigra), and Lena Lehmann, who is a full-time education officer at the Miteinander association. Both have different reasons for their commitment. Sarah Sisouphantavong has experienced racism herself, Lena Lehmann wants to be effective in society: for her, living democracy also means helping to shape it.
This is more important than ever, says Mayor Egbert Geier, who also supports the education weeks. “This is a rather bitter assessment, because we have to honestly ask ourselves: weren’t we, wasn’t our society, much more advanced? At the moment, however, many people are feeling a shift to the right: xenophobia and nationalism are on the rise,” said Geier in a welcoming speech for this year’s education weeks.
The two-week event is only possible thanks to the support of numerous partners. The educational weeks are funded by the partnership for democracy “Hallianz für Vielfalt” with funds from the federal program “Living Democracy! – Actively against right-wing extremism, violence and misanthropy” and by the Ministry of Social Affairs as part of the state program “We are the country. Democracy. Diversity. Cosmopolitanism. Saxony-Anhalt” – a total of around 25,000 euros. Around 60 organizations are cooperation partners, from the Peace Circle to “Grandmas against the Right”, trade unions, social associations, the volunteer agency and the Saxony-Anhalt Refugee Council.
“It’s nice to create the framework for this so that people can experience how many people in Halle are committed to civil society,” says Sarah Sisouphantavong. And the 2,000 visitors thank her and the other volunteers from the Education Working Group for this.
