Today Friends of Simon Wiesenthal Center's (FSWC) Education Department was at a Catholic school in Vaughan with Holocaust survivor Bill Glied for a morning of impactful messages. The visit was organized by a Grade 8 teacher who has attended Freedom Day with her students in the past. The classes had recently finished doing a novel study on the book Daniel’s Story. Initially it was supposed to be all Grades 7 and 8 students, but evidently this morning as word spread through the school and everyone was very much looking forward to our visit, multiple Grade 6 teachers asked if it would be alright to join because they were currently reading Louis Lowry’s Number the Stars. 

This meant there were three full grades of students sitting attentively in the school gymnasium. FSWC Educator Daniella spoke first and explained FSWC’s mandate and some of our programs. She also gave the group a brief overview of the Holocaust and then introduced Bill Glied to speak to the students. Daniella and Bill were both welcomed very warmly by the school, and subsequently thanked by staff and students – two girls asked for my autograph! 

The school librarian set up a whole table of books and pictures for the students to flip through both before and after the workshop, including The Diary of Anne Frank and Hana’s Suitcase. This past summer the librarian and her teenage daughter made a visit to Auschwitz, so she had a large full-color photo album for students to look through as well.

The Tour for Humanity also continued its travels, spending its first day of three in Stratford, where we will be all week working with high school students. FSWC Educator Elena presented the Global Perspectives on Genocide workshop to Grade 12 students all day today. The teacher who coordinated our visit was really blown away by the workshop and was very touched when Elena gave her a copy of Holocaust Survivor Max Eisen's book, By Chance Alone, for her school. The students were also a pleasure to work with. They were very impressed with the facility and although there wasn't a lot of knowledge about genocides since World War II, most of the students had watched the film Schindler's List and talked about the broader context of the Holocaust so Elena talked about the Righteous Among the Nations and connected figures like Schindler to Romeo Dallaire when we were discussing the Rwandan Genocide. 

One interesting and slightly troubling moment from the 3rd workshop of the day was when the organizing teacher told me that she was concerned about a student in the group because she had caught him drawing a swastika imposed over a cross earlier in the semester. Knowing this, Elena spoke with the group about the fact that in all of the different genocidal situations we examined, each perpetrator group used young people to commit violence. Elena talked about the Hitler Youth and other forms of brainwashing like the use of child soldiers in African conflicts as well as the children who were members of the Khmer Rouge. Elena also talked about manipulation through fear and propaganda and asked the students to think about why young people fall victim to these tactics.