Tetyana
Tkachenko's life was changed forever in 1986 when there was an accident at the
Chernobyl nuclear plant -- at the time she was teaching her class just 30 km away!
After the incident, Tetyana Tkachenko's students saw her classroom as a safe haven
-- their parents and other adults were distraught and confused, as they were forced
to remain in the contaminated Chernobyl zone, but Tetyana created a climate to
make them feel safer in their classroom. "We decided to work out our own
democratic rules: togetherness, friendliness, fairness, happiness, empathy and
self-esteem. Which in the long run resulted in WE-NESS. We are human beings first,
we said, we are boys and girls or other members of the society only secondly.”
These ideas eventually grew into a peace education and empowerment curriculum.
In 1990 she was the only teacher from the Ukraine chosen with 15 other Soviet
teachers to participate in an Educators for Peace and Social Responsibility program
between the Soviet Union and the United States in Flint, Michigan. In 1994 she
published a set of English teaching materials for students that integrated self-esteem,
peace, human rights and environmental awareness. Three years later she started
a non-governmental organization, Women For the Future, which brought educators
together to promote peace education and a culture of peace. Tetyana Tkachenko
believes that young people want to make the world a better place, and she has
dedicated her life to helping show that we can all help create a better world.
Tetyana Tkachenko was nominated for the 2005 Nobel Peace Prize as part of the
1000 Women for the Nobel Peace Prize project.
