UK students discuss visit to Holocaust sites
A group of UK students are bringing the past to the present as they discuss a trip they took to Holocaust sites in Poland last year.
The Division of Student Affairs is sponsoring the presentation in the Small Ballroom of the Student Center today at noon. It is open to all students and lunch will be provided.
The hour-long presentation will begin with an introduction to the 2006 March of Remembrance and Hope, which the 31 UK students attended while they were in Poland.
The presentation also features a slide-show of the trip. UK employee and graduate student Karen Clancy, who went on the trip, will narrate the slide show.
Clancy acknowledged the solemnity of studying the Holocaust, but praised the march as a very educational experience.
“It’s an opportunity to experience what can happen when groups are excluded by society,” she said. “The majority of students felt it was a life-changing experience.”
Beth Goldstein, chair of the Department of Educational Policy Studies and Evaluation in the College of Education, led the trip last year.
Goldstein said the trip would not have been possible without scholarships granted by Joe Kelly, the former president of Columbia Gas. She said the full cost of the march was covered for most of the UK students attending.
As part of the trip, Goldstein created a three-credit-hour course on the Holocaust and causes of genocide that the 31 students had to take. In addition to their preparation at UK, Goldstein said that before they went to the March in Poland, they met in Newark, N.J.
“I think the preparation was important prior to going,” she said. “It was important that we had the same shared knowledge about the Holocaust and the way it affected the … victims.”
As a part of her course, Goldstein required each student to do individual projects to show the importance of knowing this part of history.
The presentation will close with Stephanie Denton, Katrina Hutchison and Allison Tabor, three students who went on last year’s trip. Denton, Hutchinson and Tabor will discuss their reactions to their individual experiences as well as take questions from the audience.
“While there where commonalities within the group, no two people responded in exactly the same way,” Denton said. “I will simply be sharing a glimpse of my take-away on the experience.”
Denton hopes that attendees will walk away from the presentation understanding at least one point.
“We all face choices which impact the lives of others everyday,” Denton said. “It is my hope that we will each strive to make more choices which help one another as we navigate the challenges of life.”
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