Friends of Simon Wiesenthal Center for Holocaust Studies (FSWC) was pleased to welcome a new group of teachers today to the Tom & Anna Koffler Tolerance Training Centre for Holocaust Educator Certificate Course. The Holocaust Educator Certificate Course is a four-day program that investigates effective methods of integrating Holocaust education into the elementary and high school curriculum.  Through lessons in pre-war Jewish life and the history of antisemitism, along with an intensive study of the rise of Nazism, teachers engage in thoughtful discussion using primary documentation and survivor testimony along with contemporary data and statistics to bring this history to life in their classroom.  

Educators from the Durham District School Board, Peterborough, Victoria, Northumberland, Clarington Catholic District School Board, Simcoe Muskoka Catholic District School Board, Toronto District School Board and York Region District School Board in Ontario along with the Regina Catholic Schools Board in Saskatchewan have all joined the course this week. 

Day one was filled with great discussions around antisemitism - both past and present, and ways to integrate this learning into the study of the Holocaust. Teachers also delved into pre-war Jewish life, making connections both personally to the content as well as emphasizing the importance of including this content in lessons of the Holocaust for their students. Common sentiment was that students needed to be introduced to life before 1933 in order to understand the diversity within the Jewish community, outside of Nazi propaganda.