The Stone Soup Leadership Institute’s Diversity & SEL Curriculum and Courses based on the book, Stone Soup for the World: Life-Changing Stories of Everyday Heroes is a treasure. It gives educators a powerful way to engage students through real-life stories with meaningful lessons that address the importance of SEL (social-emotional learning) values of caring for ourselves, others, and for the community.

The Institute’s noble work with students, teachers and schools reminds me of how we created one of the nation’s first SEL curriculum and founded two schools with SEL as a central pillar.  We worked alongside educators, political & business leaders, and a group Nobel Laureates to reflect on the educational needs of our society. We decided that the central foundation of a school is beyond students’ knowledge. We must give them an opportunity to think, act, and lay the foundation for life-long learning.  The Institute’s curriculum and online courses gives teachers the tools they need to bring SEL into their classrooms.  I encourage everyone who cares about our children, their future and ours to bring these tools into our schools.

Karen Stone McCown
The Nueva Learning Center and The Synapse School
Featured in Daniel Goldman’s best seller Emotional Intelligence
New York Times review

The dramatic and heartening stories in Stone Soup for the World immediately immerse readers in other cultures and countries, and engage them in the struggles of real heroes who fight battles against violence, disease and hunger within their individual lives, their communities and nations.  The Curriculum provides stimulating questions for students, values and qualities exemplified in the stories, lessons gleaned from the narratives, activities for language arts and social studies classes, and project ideas for community service. The self-paced curriculum emphasizes improving young people’s reading and higher-order thinking skills, ensures that the Stone Soup selections can support discussions on global interdependence, cross-cultural issues, cultural and ethnic diversity, conflict management, and universal human rights. Through the narratives of these individuals’ intimate struggles and final successes, the young reader takes away a vision of victory and, hence, a greater willingness to engage the struggles in life. For, if these real people in their real stories can live such vibrant lives, accomplish so much, and in the end prevail, could not the young reader find comparable courage to face the inevitable challenges in his life? If Stone Soup can accomplish that feat, even for only one young mind, it would truly have been worth its place in our classroom. 

Global TeachNet, National Peace Corps Association; Association for Supervision & Curriculum Development

Stone Soup for the World provides the hope. The Diversity & SEL Curriculum provides the how. The combination is very powerful.

Marty Rogol, former director,
USA for Africa (We Are The World, Hands Across America)

The Stone Soup for the World Diversity & SEL Curriculum is a magnificent tool combining the experiential with the intellectual. It will help people everywhere who are working with youngsters, teachers, social workers, AmeriCorps, Teacher Corps and Peace Corps – to spread the Stone Soup message around the world.

Martin I. Scherr,
Child Welfare League of America

The Stone Soup for the World’s Diversity & SEL Curriculum is full of real life stories that will interest people of all ages – and from which they can learn. It provides excellent ideas and activities to help bring those stories to life. For many of our YMCAs, these publications have become effective reflection tools, enabling them to engage participants in important community service activities.

David R. Mercer
National Executive Director
YMCA of the USA

 The Stone Soup for the World: Life-Changing Stories of Everyday Heroes Diversity & SEL Curriculum is a terrific tool for teachers who want to shape the lives and characters of young people. It is accessible, friendly and encourages thoughtful reflections on service that will move the whole field of service-learning forward.

Kathleen Kennedy Townsend
Lieutenant Governor, Maryland

If we can engage more youth in service learning through Stone Soup for the World we can eradicate the incidence of youth violence in our homes, schools, neighborhoods and our country.

Antoinette Mensah
Director, Milwaukee YMCA

I just discovered Stone Soup for the World’s Diversity & SEL Curriculum and plan to use it as required text for my ESL reading and composition class.  It is informative, fun and accessible for students.

Barbara Hockman,
City College of San Francisco

As the field of service learning continues to grow, it is important that teachers have resources like the Stone Soup for the World Diversity & SEL Curriculum to develop quality service-learning initiatives. I have used the Stone Soup story as a metaphor for service-learning -people joining their collective energy to create resources and strengthen all who serve.

Marilyn Smith Ph.D.,
Director Service-Learning Corporation for National Service

The Stone Soup Leadership Institute’s Diversity & SEL Curriculum is a remarkable textbook that personalizes history for young people while teaching them character, courage and consideration for others – key ingredients for building community.

Linda Forsyth, Director,
California Commission on Improving Life Through Service

Our mentors found the Stone Soup for the World Diversity & SEL Curriculum to be a fabulous resource. It gave them a very practical way of showing their young people how others their age are doing something positive in the world – so they can too!

Frank Kortwright,
Big Brothers/Big Sisters of New York City

The Stone Soup Leadership Institute’s Diversity & SEL Curriculum meets one of the Foundation’s primary goals: the integration of ethical development into children’s school experience. In the light of recent events, it is increasingly important that we encourage our children to understand the root causes of human suffering in the world and the power we each have to take action. 

Harumitsu Inouye,
Executive Director,
Shinnyo-en Foundation

  The book and the Diversity & SEL Curriculum are excellent youth development tools. We plan to use them with all our after-school programs (YESC, Y’s Start groups, Leadership for Empowerment). This summer, we hope to put books in the hands of all teens so they can read stories to kids in our Summer Adventure Day Camps.

Cristine Patlan
Resource Coordinator
YMCA Minneapolis MN

Whether you are 12 or 24, Stone Soup for the World Diversity & SEL Curriculum both entertaining and educational, giving you a balanced view of the world and its problems –and the tools we can use to make things better.

John Scott Johnson, 17
The Field School, Washington D.C.

The Stone Soup for the World Diversity & SEL Curriculum is a great tool for Volunteer Centers who want to inspire, train, motivate and retain their volunteers. It’s especially helpful for those who want to engage teens and contribute to the exciting field of service learning.

Andrea Jolly, Director,
Montgomery County Volunteer Center, Rockville, MD

If you are a mentor and are committed to kids, you will find the Stone Soup for the World Diversity & SEL Curriculum is an indispensable handbook. It teaches young people how we can reach beyond the boundaries of our own communities and make a difference on the other side of town or on the other side of the world.

Randi Vega, Executive Director
Martha’s Vineyard Chamber of Commerce

Our young people were able to focus on a broader view of the world and talk about the difference between giving up and sticking with it when faced with tough situations. They also saw people not unlike themselves who came from a life of struggle to achieve something great. This was the most important lesson they learned. The Diversity & SEL Curriculum’s format covers a range of areas that can be adjusted to the needs of our different students. It also allows for it to be used in a variety of places and for a variety of reasons.  The Activities Section was especially helpful among my volunteers in generating new ideas. It will be a great resource for years to come. Thank you so much for choosing us to participate in this pilot project. It has been an exciting, fun and a good experience for all involved!

Terri Mulks, YMCA Program Coordinator, Boston, MA