Expedition Friend & Foe

The purpose of FRIEND&FOE is to give (young) people, students and their teachers’ tools to handle conflict in a constructive manner, in their personal life and in society at large; and actively prevent the spreading of xenophobia and radicalisation, social exclusion, discrimination and bullying within Dutch society. For a period of two years Critical Mass will visit 50 to 70 schools for secondary and senior secondary vocational education (MBO) in the Netherlands, especially in rural areas, to engage in conversations with 20.000 youngsters.

We travel to schools with five sea containers, packed with ‘experiences’. In an intimate atmosphere students are encouraged to explore their friends and foes; who are they, and how did they turn into that?

Together with our trainers, students search for (new) ways to no longer think in contradictions – friends or foes – and to find ways to deal constructively with diversity. Within school, but also in society. In additional lessons mentors or teachers are encouraged to discuss social issues in the classroom and at school, continuing with the experiences their students gained in the containers. The lessons are directed to specific courses, such as mentor class, social studies and history, but also Loopbaan & Burgerschap (career and citizenship, at vocational education). Of course, different levels and years of education are taken into account.

In mentor classes and/or Loopbaan & Burgerschap courses, students work on social safety. They break with old patterns and experience the effects of different behaviour. They learn to deal with conflicting interests and look for constructive solutions. Finally, they make their own plan of how they want to improve the classroom atmosphere. Given the fact that extremism and radicalisation is currently a hot item, the past year we developed an additional lesson for social studies on conflict and radicalisation. As in the past year different media have repeatedly mentioned that teachers struggle to address these themes at schools, we expect this lesson to be a good and very much needed addition to (our) current lesson materials.

In additional questionnaires as well as during the students’ visit to our containers we collect findings on the question: what is the status quo on the social environment at school? Based on the collected data we give schools our feedback and provide them with tools to improve their social policy. We actively stimulate schools to further deal with the problems at hand, possibly with our help. We refer to our additional practical trainings and, depending on the needs and demands of the school, we give extensive competency trainings to students and teachers at 20 schools at least. Within these trainings practical tools will be given to improve the social environment at schools and to contribute to a sustainable socially safe environment at schools.

The core of FRIEND&FOE are the five confrontation containers that are placed at schoolyards, each of them dealing with one of the following five topics:

• Bullying & dealing with people who are ‘different’
• Exclusion
• Prejudice & discrimination
• Conflict hardening & conflict escalation/radicalisation
• Reflecting on your own role & social pressure

Kontakt:

Grebbeberglaan 15
3527 VX Utrecht
The Netherlands

Hiske Arts
Email: hiske@criticalmass.nu 
Tel: (+31) (0) 30 271 49 56

For more information on this programme, click here