Dear County and District Superintendents and Charter School Administrators:

Application Open for Second Annual School Leadership to End Hate Winter Institute

I am pleased to invite your local educational agencies (LEAs) to apply for the second annual School Leadership to End Hate Winter Institute, which will take place March 2, 2026, in Sacramento. The event is co-hosted by the California Department of Education (CDE) and the California Teachers Collaborative for Holocaust and Genocide Education (California Teachers Collaborative).

In January 2025, the CDE and I partnered with the California Teachers Collaborative to co-host the inaugural School Leadership to End Hate Winter Institute, a first-of-its-kind professional learning event to combat hate in schools by training administrators in research-based practices to address and prevent hate and to teach about the Holocaust and genocide. This institute gave administrators access to the kind of high-quality, research-based professional learning on Holocaust and genocide education that is typically only available to classroom teachers.

This year, the opportunity to attend School Leadership to End Hate comes amid a continued global rise in antisemitism and hate, which has reverberated here in California. We must condemn any instance of hate speech on our campuses, we must prevent our young people from being co-opted by hate groups, and we must protect our schools as learning environments where students of all backgrounds, including our Jewish students, are safe to learn and thrive.

This professional learning opportunity is part of my Education to End Hate Initiative, which represents my continued commitment to proactively and directly combat hate in California schools. I first launched Education to End Hate in September 2020 to combat bias, bigotry, and racism. Since that time, Education to End Hate has expanded to directly address rising antisemitism and all forms of hate.

The School Leadership to End Hate Winter Institutes are co-hosted by the CDE and the California Teachers Collaborative. The California Teachers Collaborative was established by Senate Bill 1277 (Stern) as a network of 15 leading genocide and Holocaust education organizations and survivors who are charged with expanding and improving professional development and standards-aligned curricula on genocide, including the Holocaust, for educators in California public schools.

This year, the CDE and the California Teachers Collaborative are inviting LEAs to send teams of educators, including both administrators and teachers, to the School Leadership to End Hate Institute. Teams are encouraged to apply early, as registration for the first School Leadership to End Hate Institute quickly filled to capacity.

California schools and districts serving grades six to twelve are encouraged to apply on the event web page at https://holocaustcenter.jfcs.org/winter-institute-2026.

To read more about my Education to End Hate Initiative and the 2025 Winter Institute, please view the CDE news releases at https://www.cde.ca.gov/nr/ne/yr20/yr20rel77.asp and https://www.cde.ca.gov/nr/ne/yr25/yr25rel06.asp.

Sincerely,

Tony Thurmond
State Superintendent of Public Instruction