Published 5 June 2023
In January, BartholoNews reported that two St Bart’s students, Isabella Warner and Ariana Vlahakis, were successful in securing two student places on The Holocaust Educational Trust’s Lessons from Auschwitz Project. Subsequently, two more students, Ellie Klecun and Elliot Rabinowitz, were fortunate to be offered additional places. Ellie (12E4) tells us more about her experience.
My experience with Lessons from Auschwitz was an eye-opening experience. The Auschwitz concentration camp was located on the outskirts of Oświęcim. It was later referred to as “Auschwitz I” or “Main Camp.” Auschwitz-Birkenau “Auschwitz II,” was located near the Polish village Brzezink; this is about 2 miles from the Main Camp. When visiting the camps, it became clear how affecting the experience can be, and why the preserved remains of the camps acts as an important symbol. It allows us to reflect on the prosecution of people for following their religion, or not being the ‘same’ as everyone else. Once we returned home, we completed a next step online seminar and listened to the testimony from Janine Webber. As a group we presented the importance of the Holocaust to Year 12 and KS3 and qualified as Holocaust Ambassadors through the Holocaust Education Trust and we plan on working on more ways to humanise the Holocaust in the near future, bringing to light testimonies of survivors, as hearing from the people and family members allow people to understand from their perspective what it was like.”
