{"id":20285,"date":"2023-05-23T14:17:27","date_gmt":"2023-05-23T14:17:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.macalester.edu\/160-news\/?p=20285"},"modified":"2026-01-18T22:58:13","modified_gmt":"2026-01-18T22:58:13","slug":"two-macalester-students-awarded-10k-grant-to-empower-teachers-in-brazil","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.macalester.edu\/news\/2023\/05\/two-macalester-students-awarded-10k-grant-to-empower-teachers-in-brazil\/","title":{"rendered":"Two Macalester students awarded $10k grant to empower teachers in Brazil"},"content":{"rendered":"

Macalester students <\/span>Valeska Kohan \u201823<\/b> and  <\/span>Amanda de Souza \u201825 <\/b>have been awarded $10,000 from <\/span>Davis Projects for Peace<\/span><\/a> to carry out their own project in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, where both students grew up. For over 15 years, Projects for Peace has worked with partner institutions to seek out young peacebuilders and encourage them  to develop innovative and community-centered responses to pressing global issues. <\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

For their project, \u201cSeeds of Peace: Fighting Racism in Rio de Janeiro by Empowering Public School Teachers,\u201d Kohan and de Souza will organize and present two workshops in June and July to public school teachers in the Brazilian metropolis. These workshops aim to provide the tools and resources teachers need in order to implement anti-racist practices and facilitate discussions about race in their classrooms. <\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Kohan, an economics and environmental studies double major, said she hopes these workshops can offer younger generations access to better resources and help reduce racist bullying.<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIf more teachers promote anti-racist practices in classrooms, fewer students will be discriminated against,\u201d Kohan said. \u201cWe hope this creates a ripple effect of Black empowerment, or youth empowerment, in general.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

For de Souza, a recently completed internship at <\/span>Instituto Marielle Franco<\/span><\/a> through Macalester\u2019s summer internship grant program provided some vital inspiration for the project. <\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

De Souza said that Marielle Franco was a Black woman and an activist for human rights, racial justice, and LGBTQIA+ rights. Her murder in 2018 remains unresolved.<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe institution was created to honor her memory and fight for her legacy, and it\u2019s all surrounded by racial justice and advocating for the lives of Black people around the country. Our project is very connected to that,\u201d de Souza said. <\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

De Souza, an environmental science and political science double major, said that her time at Mac has given her the opportunity to work and research internationally. <\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI really want to work with human rights, and this project will definitely enhance my experience and the knowledge I want to have to be a better professional in the future,\u201d she said. <\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Both de Souza and Kohan also said they hope the project inspires other international students to think big and take action. <\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cEven if one person tells you it isn\u2019t a good idea, talk to other people until it becomes a great idea and you can apply with confidence,\u201d said Kohan. \u201cWe\u2019re here for you and we want to help.\u201d<\/span><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Macalester students Valeska Kohan \u201823 and\u00a0 Amanda de Souza \u201825 have been awarded $10,000 from Davis Projects for Peace.<\/p>","protected":false},"author":1077,"featured_media":20287,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-20285","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-college-newswire","mediatype-articles"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"fields":{"article_type":[8],"flickr_photoset_id":"","youtube_id":"","square_thumbnail":false,"press_photos":false,"story_title":"","story_caption":"","rotations":false,"maps":false,"marker_title":"","marker_text":"","geographic_location":false,"feature_embed":"","custom_link_url":"","news_icon_name":"","image_options":false,"main_feature_story":"","custom_image":false,"custom_feature_title":"","custom_feature_caption":"","custom_markup":"","custom_markup_link":"","custom_markup_title":"","custom_markup_caption":"","byline":"","post_thumbnail_style":"default","press_downloads":false},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.macalester.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20285","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.macalester.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.macalester.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.macalester.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1077"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.macalester.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20285"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.macalester.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20285\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":30133,"href":"https:\/\/www.macalester.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20285\/revisions\/30133"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.macalester.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/20287"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.macalester.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20285"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.macalester.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20285"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.macalester.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20285"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}