Innovative research methods in educating for peace and human rights

Group Submission Type: Formal Panel Session

Proposal

In a time of profound division -marked by political instability, racialized inequities, settler colonial erasure, intensified state violence, and a mounting youth mental health crisis -education stands at a crossroads. It can serve as an instrument of control, reproducing exclusion and compliance, or as a practice of liberation, cultivating solidarity, dignity, and peace. This panel brings together four transformative papers that reimagine education through human rights, youth leadership, Indigenous and queer knowledge, and intergenerational resistance. Collectively, they demonstrate that peace in divided contexts is not simply the absence of conflict but the active creation of conditions of belonging, joy, and justice.
The first project highlights a Youth Participatory Action Research (YPAR) initiative in which graduating high school seniors co-created a human rights–based evaluation of their school. Rejecting top-down accreditation processes, the students grounded their work in foundational texts such as the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the Convention on the Rights of the Child. They then developed their own frameworks and research questions, drawing on interviews, focus groups, autoethnography, and school data. Their findings revealed stark racial and socioeconomic disparities in course enrollment and disciplinary practices. Inspired by international NGOs, the students are now preparing a “shadow” counter-report to the school’s official accreditation review. This counter-report highlights student perspectives and calls for reforms to expand access, amplify representation, and strengthen belonging. Their work positions students as organic intellectuals who transform lived experience into knowledge, showing how YPAR can advance equity and human rights education within schools.
The second paper introduces the Human Rights Kiki (HR Kiki), a relational and resistance-oriented framework shaped by Indigenous scholarship and queer theory. Too often, Indigenous and 2SLGBTQIA+ communities are erased or tokenized within mainstream DEI and LGBTQIA+ initiatives. The HR Kiki resists these erasures by centering dialogue, kinship, resistance, and joy as guiding principles for transformative practice. Reimagining circle-based approaches as living, relational traditions rather than relics of Western healing imaginaries, the HR Kiki offers practical strategies for classrooms, workplaces, and community spaces. By affirming Indigenous knowledge, queer joy, and interdependence, it challenges colonial myths of superiority and cultivates human rights work rooted in safety, consent, and collective thriving.
The third paper emerges from the urgent struggles of undocumented middle school youth and DACAmented educators, who face daily threats of detention, deportation, and disappearance by the state. In response, this initiative sustains intergenerational Encuentros Educativos and Encuentros de Resistencia—spaces of convivencia grounded in Human Rights Education, UndocuCrit, Chicana/Feminist Methodologies, and Transformational Resistance. These encuentros weave together political education (such as Know Your Rights workshops), storytelling, artivism, pláticas, and college pathway support. By centering undocumented youth as knowledge holders and co-researchers, and DACAmented educators as femtors and co-conspirators, the project builds solidarity across generations, nurturing joy and resilience alongside rage and resistance. In a political climate where undocumented lives remain precarious, these encuentros affirm community as a radical site of survival, healing, and collective action.
The final paper addresses the escalating youth mental health crisis, underscored by the U.S. Surgeon General’s 2023 warning of an “epidemic of loneliness and isolation.” In this YPAR study, high school students investigated how they experience anxiety, depression, and stress within rigid school systems shaped by white supremacy culture. Conducted during a politically turbulent period, the process emphasized care and joy —youth set the tone with playlists, snacks, and creative journal prompts that fostered trust and connection. Findings showed that student distress arises less from individual failings than from systemic pressures: standardization, competition, and depersonalized classrooms. Youth co-researchers called for profound shifts in how schools relate to students, design learning, and recognize full humanity. Their work culminated in a zine distributed to district leaders, transforming research into art and action while embodying Paulo Freire’s vision of conscientização, or critical consciousness.
Though distinct in context, these four papers converge on a shared set of commitments: centering marginalized voices, human rights as living practice, relational resistance and joy, and intergenerational solidarity. The panelists invite educators, researchers, administrators, and organizers to consider what it means to pursue peace in contexts where exclusion and violence are normalized. Participants will encounter concrete strategies for implementing YPAR in schools, applying HR Kiki principles in diverse settings, sustaining undocumented youth through encuentros, and addressing mental health with liberatory practices.
Together, these papers affirm that education, when rooted in human rights, community, and joy, becomes a practice of liberation. In a divided world, youth, Indigenous, undocumented, and queer communities are already building the blueprints for peace.

Sub Unit

• General Pool

Chair

• Marna Wolak, University of San Francisco

Individual Presentations

• Building our seat at the table: YPAR for human rights in public schools - David Andrew Tow, UNIVERSITY OF SAN FRANCISCO

• Let’s have a human rights kiki: Creating conversations centering healing, resistance, and joy at the intersections of indigenous, queer, colonial paradigms - Paul David Terry, Graduate student

• Undocumented convivencias: Intergenerational resistance in times of crisis - Cristian Aguilar Valverde, University of San Francisco

• Chill vibe: On teen mental health and wellness, a youth participatory action research study - Marna Wolak, University of San Francisco