JimInCO
March 5th, 2008, 12:06 AM
http://www.cjnews.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=14156&Itemid=86
Wednesday 5th of March 2008
Students flock to Holocaust program in Europe
By PAUL LUNGEN, Staff Reporter
Thursday, 06 March 2008
More than 60 years after the last Nazi concentration camp was liberated, interest in the Holocaust continues to resonate among young people.
How else to explain the growing desire to visit, first hand, the sites in Germany and Poland where the Nazis planned and executed their fiendish designs?
Organizers of the March of Remembrance and Hope (MRH) were surprised by the large numbers of university students who applied to participate in this year’s event, a one-week trip that runs from May 16 to 23 and immerses participants in the horrors of the Holocaust. A similar program, the March of the Living, is geared toward Jewish high school students.
Though they have budgeted for only 60 participants, MRH organizers received some 150 applications, meaning the majority will be left behind.
That’s the unfortunate reality when working with limited means, though the number of students who can be accommodated would increase if “an angel” comes through with funds.
Carla Wittes, director of the Canadian Centre for Diversity, the main sponsor of MRH, held open the possibility of expanding the program to accommodate more than the original 60, but her organization is more concerned about creating a stable and sustainable funding base that will support the MRH for years to come.
As of earlier this month, fundraising efforts to support the 60 were still underway, but Wittes was confident that at least that goal will be achieved.
The 60 students will gather in New York for an orientation session before travelling to Europe. In Germany, they will visit Wannsee, the Berlin suburb where Nazi bureaucrats devised the Final Solution – the systematic murder of European Jews. They will also visit the once-thriving Jewish centres in Warsaw, Krakow and Lublin, as well as the former death camps of Auschwitz Birkenau and Majdanek, where millions were murdered.
Participants will be accompanied by Holocaust survivors, who will share their experiences.
As the MRH makes clear on its website, “You will feel their pain, be strengthened by their courage and become a witness yourself by experiencing the Holocaust through the stories of these remaining survivors. Throughout your travels in Poland, you will be encouraged to freely discuss your feelings and impressions.”
Eli Rubenstein, director of education for MRH, said the program has touched many hearts and changed many participants, making them vigorous advocates for tolerance and opponents of anti-Semitism.
“They become transmitters of [survivors’] messages,” he said. “These are non-Jewish students who have taken on the burden of remembering what the Holocaust survivors have undergone, experienced and suffered.
“It breaks my heart [that only 60 will go], because these are students expressing sincerity and dedication to learning about the Holocaust,” he added
The students hail from across Canada and come from a number of religious and ethnic communities. Successful applicants must demonstrate leadership qualities, take part in extra-curricular activities and show a desire to spread the lessons they gather in Europe, Wittes said.
Alumni of the 2005 MRH, which embarked on a joint trip with the teen-oriented March of the Living, formed a student group on campus called SHOUT, Students Helping Others Understand Tolerance, she said.
MRH was launched as an international program in 2001, when only 15 Canadians applied, one-tenth the current number. The international program was dropped in 2007, but the Canadian program continued to operate that year with close to 60 students visiting European sites.
“We felt it was way too important to let it lapse,” Wittes said “We’ve taken it on as our program.”
While the international program foundered due to lack of funds, interest outside Canada has continued.
Organizers were contacted by two New York universities – Nazareth College and Hobart and William Smith Colleges – which will join the 60-strong Canadian delegation.
Canadian students are asked to contribute $1,000 each toward the trip. The remainder of the cost is subsidized. The Canadian Centre for Diversity is the main sponsor, while universities provide some financial assistance, as does National Jewish Campus Life.
For more information, Wittes can be reached at 416-597-9693, ext. 25.
Wednesday 5th of March 2008
Students flock to Holocaust program in Europe
By PAUL LUNGEN, Staff Reporter
Thursday, 06 March 2008
More than 60 years after the last Nazi concentration camp was liberated, interest in the Holocaust continues to resonate among young people.
How else to explain the growing desire to visit, first hand, the sites in Germany and Poland where the Nazis planned and executed their fiendish designs?
Organizers of the March of Remembrance and Hope (MRH) were surprised by the large numbers of university students who applied to participate in this year’s event, a one-week trip that runs from May 16 to 23 and immerses participants in the horrors of the Holocaust. A similar program, the March of the Living, is geared toward Jewish high school students.
Though they have budgeted for only 60 participants, MRH organizers received some 150 applications, meaning the majority will be left behind.
That’s the unfortunate reality when working with limited means, though the number of students who can be accommodated would increase if “an angel” comes through with funds.
Carla Wittes, director of the Canadian Centre for Diversity, the main sponsor of MRH, held open the possibility of expanding the program to accommodate more than the original 60, but her organization is more concerned about creating a stable and sustainable funding base that will support the MRH for years to come.
As of earlier this month, fundraising efforts to support the 60 were still underway, but Wittes was confident that at least that goal will be achieved.
The 60 students will gather in New York for an orientation session before travelling to Europe. In Germany, they will visit Wannsee, the Berlin suburb where Nazi bureaucrats devised the Final Solution – the systematic murder of European Jews. They will also visit the once-thriving Jewish centres in Warsaw, Krakow and Lublin, as well as the former death camps of Auschwitz Birkenau and Majdanek, where millions were murdered.
Participants will be accompanied by Holocaust survivors, who will share their experiences.
As the MRH makes clear on its website, “You will feel their pain, be strengthened by their courage and become a witness yourself by experiencing the Holocaust through the stories of these remaining survivors. Throughout your travels in Poland, you will be encouraged to freely discuss your feelings and impressions.”
Eli Rubenstein, director of education for MRH, said the program has touched many hearts and changed many participants, making them vigorous advocates for tolerance and opponents of anti-Semitism.
“They become transmitters of [survivors’] messages,” he said. “These are non-Jewish students who have taken on the burden of remembering what the Holocaust survivors have undergone, experienced and suffered.
“It breaks my heart [that only 60 will go], because these are students expressing sincerity and dedication to learning about the Holocaust,” he added
The students hail from across Canada and come from a number of religious and ethnic communities. Successful applicants must demonstrate leadership qualities, take part in extra-curricular activities and show a desire to spread the lessons they gather in Europe, Wittes said.
Alumni of the 2005 MRH, which embarked on a joint trip with the teen-oriented March of the Living, formed a student group on campus called SHOUT, Students Helping Others Understand Tolerance, she said.
MRH was launched as an international program in 2001, when only 15 Canadians applied, one-tenth the current number. The international program was dropped in 2007, but the Canadian program continued to operate that year with close to 60 students visiting European sites.
“We felt it was way too important to let it lapse,” Wittes said “We’ve taken it on as our program.”
While the international program foundered due to lack of funds, interest outside Canada has continued.
Organizers were contacted by two New York universities – Nazareth College and Hobart and William Smith Colleges – which will join the 60-strong Canadian delegation.
Canadian students are asked to contribute $1,000 each toward the trip. The remainder of the cost is subsidized. The Canadian Centre for Diversity is the main sponsor, while universities provide some financial assistance, as does National Jewish Campus Life.
For more information, Wittes can be reached at 416-597-9693, ext. 25.