Today marked the Tour for Humanity's first visit to the Sarnia area, at a high school in a small farming community with a population of approximately 3,500. The Grade 7-12 school has less than 200 students, which means Tour for Humanity and Friends of Simon Wiesenthal Center (FSWC) Educator Daniella were able to see almost the entire school today. In fact, all Grades 7-11 students were chosen to take part in the workshops today. There were 6 Canadian Experience workshops that were presented.

The school has a significant Indigenous population and educators in this school have been working hard to educate about this aspect of Canadian history. The Grade 7/8 split class that took part in the program demonstrated this knowledge when the discussion turned to the Residential School system . When Daniella presented the class with the infamous before and after pictures of Thomas Moore (an Indigenous child taken to a Residential School), several students raised their hands and explained that they had learned all about Residential Schools both in school and through their community. Daniella found this to be very interesting and instead of telling the class about the schools, she asked the students to share what they had learned. It was a great illustration of how history isn’t just something in the past, but that it impacts both the present and future.

Questions about the Holocaust also arose, especially given that some students were being exposed to the material for the first time. The groups were horrified to learn the history of the SS St. Louis and Canada turning away Jewish refugees during their time of need.