Humanity Education as a School-Based Intervention for Healing

Violence is a large-scale public health concern that impacts the mental health of people all over the world. There is a critical need for early intervention strategies that prevent violence and foster humanity and well-being. Traditional approaches to violence prevention focus on inhibiting antisocial behavior, overlooking the benefits of promoting positive values, humanity, and prosocial behavior. Aegis Trust is an international organization dedicated to the prevention of future genocides and promotion of humanity globally through education. It developed an educational methodology that has shown evidence of effectiveness in recovering from trauma, promoting humanity, and preventing violence in post-genocide Rwanda and other countries that have experienced conflict. This program, known as Champion Humanity (CH), was found to increase positive behaviors and attitudes. The purpose of this article is to describe the core principles of Humanity Education, the CH program, and propose its utility as a school-based intervention.