Community Conversations

Bring people together for thoughtful discussions on newsworthy topics.

Online Community Conversations

Join HNY for an online conversation, facilitated by a member of our team.

Community Conversation Toolkits

For a limited time any individual or organization can explore our Community Conversation toolkits. We only ask that you register before using these materials. See below to access our virtual toolkits.

VIRTUAL TOOLKITS

Community Conversation Toolkits

Everything you need to run your own town-hall event, and a micro-grant to help fund it. A facilitator, chosen by your group, leads a conversation for 8-20 participants using the training and materials supplied by Humanities NY. The program toolkit contains a short text focused on a hot topic or occasion in American life such as immigration, MLK Jr. Day of Service, the environment, or democracy. You can browse the full listing of themes below. Toolkits are available for Adults, Young Adults, and Kids, unless otherwise noted.

Anyone may host a Community Conversation. Please note that for a limited time anyone and any organization can explore our Community Conversation toolkits. We only ask that you register before using these materials.

Community Conversations may be scheduled at any time of the year, though some themes are well-suited to commemorations, holidays and other seasonal events.

If you have questions about the program, please contact Senior Program Office Adam Capitano.

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CURRENT TOOLKITS AVAILABLE

Democracy

FOR KIDS

As our nation approaches 250 years of independence and its 58th presidential election, Community Conversations invites New Yorkers to discuss the role democracy plays in their lives as members of local, national, and global communities.
Immigration

FOR KIDS

From New Netherland to New York, immigrants from every part of the world have made their home in our state. Explore our shared history as immigrants and the descendants of immigrants, and discuss the ways that immigration continues to shape the experience of being American today.
Martin Luther King, Jr. Day of Service

FOR KIDS

Reflect on Dr. King’s legacy of service and its meaning in today’s world. What are ways of serving in your community? How has protest transformed since the days of MLK?
Environmental Stewardship

FOR KIDS

This conversation centers around the ways in which New Yorkers were early and passionate stewards of the environment and how we continue to grapple with finding a responsible balance between using and protecting our natural resources.
After Sandy

FOR KIDS

When Superstorm Sandy struck on October 29, 2012, it unleashed catastrophic damage up and down the East Coast. In its wake, New Yorkers came together to clean up, help out, and rebuild. This conversation reflects on how communities were transformed and united by Sandy, and to consider what it means to be fully restored.
9/11 National Day of Service & Remembrance

FOR KIDS

Explore how New Yorkers and people everywhere were transformed and interconnected in the aftermath of 9/11.
Friendship

FOR KIDS

Celebrating the history of the New Niagara Falls bi-national region, this toolkit is built around Alexis O’Neill’s beautiful children’s book The Kite that Bridged Two Nations. This is the story of Homan Walsh, a young man who flew his kite across the Niagara River, and whose string became the first thread in a new bridge across the Niagara Gorge. Homan’s story teaches us the value of friendship and the ways in which cooperation can help us persevere in the face of daunting odds.
Leadership

FOR KIDS

The Story of Ruby Bridges is the true story of first grader Ruby, the first and only black child to integrate her school after desegregation in 1960. Escorted daily into her new school by federal marshals, Ruby faces mobs of angry protestors, and an empty classroom. Ruby perseveres, however, through hatred, danger and loneliness with the support of her teacher and her family.
Courage

FOR KIDS

This is the true story of Alia Muhammad Baker, a librarian at the Basra Central Library in Iraq. When government officials ignore her pleas for help, Alia and her neighbors smuggle over 30,000 books to safety only days before it is burned to ground during the Iran-Iraq War. Available in English and Spanish.
Public Education

FOR KIDS

Although we have all experienced the education system, our experiences of that system vary dramatically. This conversation invites an exploration of the tensions and difficulties students face in the classroom and how academic achievement can sometimes be compromised by classroom social dynamics.
Building Compassion

FOR KIDS

This toolkit focuses on building compassion in children and the effects of bullying. The text for this conversation is Thank you, Mr. Falker by Patricia Polacco. Trisha can paint and draw beautifully, but when she looks at words on a page, all she can see is jumble. Trisha struggles and begins to feel alienated. With no friends and increasing frustration with herself, she begins hating school until a new teacher arrives. Available in English and Spanish.
Madam and the Census Man

FOR KIDS

Humanities NY is proud to announce our newest Community Conversation Toolkit, “Madame and the Census Man: Assessing Identity in Today’s America.” Built around a poem by the legendary Langston Hughes, this conversation prompts participants to think through what it means to be “counted” in our society and how the importance of participating in the census project sometimes sits in tension with a person’s personal sense of identity.
What Price Freedom?

FOR KIDS

This toolkit features a brief essay by James Baldwin and a photograph taken during the Hurricane Katrina crisis to open space for conversations about what obligations, if any, people owe each other in times of crisis.
Women’s Suffrage - Equality

FOR KIDS

Framed around the Declaration of Sentiments, a document from the Seneca Falls Convention that enumerated the rights owed to American women, this conversation helps participants explore the historical importance and contemporary relevance of the struggle for women’s suffrage in the US.
Race, History, and Representation

FOR KIDS

This toolkit uses a poem by former US Poet Laureate and Pulitzer Prize-winner Natasha Trethewey to explore how memory and culture can influence our understanding of race in American society.
Inclusion: Place and Identity

FOR KIDS

The United States has long been a destination for people in need from around the world. This toolkit opens up a space for conversation about the impact of immigration on a person’s sense of place and identity.