ProjectSomeone’s online course “From Hate to Hope: Cultivating Understanding and Resilience Skills” from January 9 to February 17, 2023

Project Someone is relaunching our massive open online course (MOOC) “From Hate to Hope: Building Understanding and Resilience.” This free, non-credit online course aims to prevent hate and radicalization by facilitating public education and providing tangible strategies to build resilience. 

ABOUT THIS COURSE

Hate is a powerful emotion that can propel people to all sorts of violent actions – from bullying people online to demonstrating physical acts of violence. It is also becoming widely visible on account of social media, and due to the polarizing nature of our times. Hate has a space as a valid emotion for human beings, even if it does hold a corrosive potential. Therefore, people need ways of dealing with their own experiences of feeling hate, and ways of being resilient when they are hated by others. These “ways of dealing with hate” include having concepts and facts about hate and its nature, as well as actionable strategies that people can put into practice.

This course offers both conceptual and actionable elements to anyone interested in learning about hate and how to make the move towards a more sustainable emotion such as hope.

WHAT YOU WILL GAIN FROM THIS COURSE

In this course, you will explore the dynamics of hate, including some of its causes. There will be an exploration of who is targeted or vulnerable to hate and the ways in which people are manipulated to feel and express hate.

The course will also offer you strategies to build resilience to hate, the most important of which is dialogue.

As much as social media can be platforms to express hate, they can also be a powerful ally in moving from hate to hope. This course discusses best practices to use social media for advocacy against hate speech.

Finally, the course will support you in analyzing and developing strategies to use social media in different sectors.

FEATURES

This course offers a variety of learning experiences including:

  • Videos where a variety of people discuss hate and ways to build resilience to it. The videos feature experts in the area, including former extremists who made the journey to the far end of hate and back.

  • Opportunities to interact with peers on this course to share experiences and insights from your lives.

  • Polls and quizzes that encourage reflection and may perhaps challenge your assumptions.

  • Interactive reading materials.

  • Reflection based exercises in each module.

COURSE OPTIONS

This course comprises 10-15 hours of learning in four modules, requiring 2-4 hours of effort per module. All four modules are available right from the beginning, and you have the flexibility to take the modules in any order. The end of module activities however, make for a better experience if done sequentially from Module 1 to 4. There is a live session at the end of weeks 1, 2, 3 and 4. All other learnings is self-paced and asynchronous.

It is recommended to complete one module per week to give yourself the space to reflect on the materials, apply it to your own context, interact with your peers and complete the end of module activity.

After the fourth module there is the fifth and optional module. You have the option to complete a capstone assignment to get a certificate of course completion.

The final assignment is peer-reviewed. If you choose to do the assignment, you will also need to review and grade two or three of your peers’ assignments. You have 2 weeks to complete your assignment and review the work of your peers.

You could make a decision about doing or not doing the final assignment at any time before the applicable due date.