♪♪ ♪♪ >> Miller: It's overwhelming.

You come in with a certain idea.

You read about things.

You see pictures.

But when you get here and you see it firsthand, it becomes real.

And that's what I want to take back to the classroom, as well, is to hopefully make it more real for my students.

>> Girl: I couldn't really fathom how people could have lost such a sense of humanity.

>> Myers: It's just not enough to teach the kids about the facts.

We have to teach them the big ideas.

So I'm bringing back that the kids have to be upstanders.

It's not enough to be an onlooker.

>> Winkler: If you're prejudiced, just come up here.

My feeling is that if we stop doing the efforts, I think we will be taken over with a tsunami of hate.

Thank you for being honest.

Liar, liar, liar.

[ Laughter ] >> Gross: Once you're in Camp Seven, this is the end of your destination.

>> Fitzpatrick: To hear it from somebody who lived it and to hear it from somebody who experienced it close to their age absolutely leaves more of an impression on them.

I don't think this is something that they'll ever forget.

>> Beatty: Welcome to a special episode of "Classroom Close-Up, New Jersey."

For many years, the New Jersey Commission on Holocaust Education has guided participants on a journey across an ocean, as well as cultures and generations.

What you are about to see is a record of how the lives of a group of educators were changed in a matter of days and how shared experiences can bring history to life for a new generation.

♪♪ >> Zabolinsky: We're at a concentration camp, and it's where a lot of the children and the teachers were sent.

>> Matthew: Located about 40 miles northwest of Prague in the Czech Republic, Terezín was the site of a concentration camp and ghetto where more than 150,000 Jewish men, women, and children were imprisoned by the Nazis during World War II.

Tens of thousands died or were killed there.

Tens of thousands more were sent from Terezín to extermination camps, where they were murdered.

>> Miller: The conditions here were horrific.

You had about 10 to 11 times the amount of people that would normally live in a city stuffed into overcrowded rooms, non-working toilets, no sanitary conditions at all.

Diseases like tuberculosis would run rampant.

If you showed any signs of sickness, you might be taken away and you would not return.

>> Guide: Everybody in camp since 14 years of age had to work.

They wore all uniforms with a simple mark -- politicals against Nazis, red triangle; prisoners of war, soldiers, green triangle.

Had to be exterminated, all gypsies were concentrated here, and they got black triangle.

Had to be exterminated, all homosexuals -- they got pink triangle.

Had to be exterminated, all Jehovah's Witness -- lilac triangle.

Had to be exterminated, all Jews, as in everywhere in Europe, they got yellow David star with inscription "Jew."

And now, please, the big original inscription on the end.

"Arbeit Mact Frei" -- Work Makes You Free.

>> Schram: The children are the ones who can't work, and they're the ones who want to eat, so, therefore, the first ones who are going to end up in the gas chambers.

And I think that that's so disturbing if you think about it from the context of how many future generations therefore get lost.

And then from the perspective of the teacher knowing that, you know, my freshman would have been in those groupings or my middle school students would have been in those groupings, and knowing that they wouldn't have made it through is very hard to hear.

>> Matthew: To dispel rumors about their extermination camps, the Nazi government permitted the Red Cross to tour Theresienstadt.

A massive staging operation was undertaken to portray the ghetto as a model Jewish settlement.

Thousands of prisoners were sent to Auschwitz before the inspection.

The deception was so successful, Hitler decided to use the camp as the setting for a propaganda film.

Kurt Gerron, a Jewish actor and director imprisoned at the camp, was promised his life in exchange for making the film.

Upon its completion, Gerron, along with much of the cast, were sent to Auschwitz and gassed upon arrival.

>> Miller: It's overwhelming.

You come in with a certain idea.

You read about things.

You see pictures.

But when you get here and you see it firsthand, it becomes real.

And that's what I want to take back to the classroom, as well, is to hopefully make it more real for my students and be able to give them a firsthand account of what these places are like.

>> Dahme: This, for teachers, is a wonderful opportunity because they know about the Holocaust.

They've seen films and they've met survivors.

But to actually be here and walk here, and it changes one forever.

And I know from her hearing from other trips with teachers that it took them a long time to digest everything they saw.

But now they are able, as a witness, to share with their students.

>> Matthew: Although Maud Dahme isn't a schoolteacher, she has taught many New Jersey students and educators about the Holocaust.

>> Dahme: I know that God and the children... >> Matthew: Whether she's coordinating the European trips or visiting schools, she has devoted much of her adult life to Holocaust education.

Maud does this because she is a Holocaust survivor.

In 1950, Maud's family came to the United States to rebuild their lives.

Maud married and started a family of her own.

As her children attended school, she became a member of the local school board.

In the early 1980s, New Jersey Governor Tom Kean appointed Maud to the State Board of Education.

She also became a member of the newly formed New Jersey Commission on Holocaust Education.

It was here she met Dr. Paul Winkler, the commission's executive director.

>> Winkler: New Jersey was the first state that passed a mandate developing curriculum about genocide, man's inhumanity to man, genocide, and the Holocaust.

>> Matthew: Paul was instrumental in the passage of the mandate requiring the Holocaust to be taught in public schools.

He also encouraged Maud to go out and share her story, something that she has done now hundreds of times, mostly in the classroom.

>> Dahme: We couldn't put up a fight.

We couldn't mobilize our forces.

And we suddenly found ourselves also an occupied country.

>> Dahme: I don't talk about any atrocities or things that I have seen.

I try to be very positive about something very negative.

Throughout that whole area, there were so many Jews hidden, adults as well as children, through that whole one section of Holland, because these people were so religious and had such a kinship to us, that they felt at a risk of their own lives, they would save us.

And I tell them, too, that all this genocides that are happening even today is all because of ethnic and religious differences, people of the same nationality, and not respecting each other.

>> Winkler: We have to help our students understand they are part of a bigger world, they are not isolates on an island somewhere, that everything they do impacts someone else.

So we are our brother's keeper.

♪♪ [ Indistinct conversations ] ♪♪ >> Matthew: While in Berlin, the teachers from New Jersey met with German school teachers to discuss approaches to teaching the Holocaust.

It was the first time since the Commission on Holocaust Education began sponsoring trips for educators that such a meeting had taken place.

The setting for this gathering was Locknitz Primary School, which was built atop the remains of a destroyed Jewish synagogue, artifacts of which now adorn the school's playground.

The discussion touched on issues both specific to teaching the history of the Holocaust and connecting those lessons to the world today.

>> Dahme: Do you incorporate that into your curriculum also, or do you just talk about the Holocaust?

Because the genocides are continuing in even this very minute.

So mostly we use the Holocaust really as an example to start with.

>> Man: My approach usually is not to concentrate on the Holocaust only.

You've talked about human rights and civil rights.

We can talk ab-- we can discuss these basic rights anywhere, in almost any topic and school.

>> Man #2: Watch the daily news on a good channel and just see enough immoral and unethical behavior in the world from all continents, wherever.

And then you've got a starting point to talk about other genocides and other criminal acts in the world.

>> Woman: There's a picture of a two-week-old baby that's dying of malnutrition and intestinal disease.

So I pull out that picture and I show it to them, and I'm like, "This is a genocide.

This is what happened in the Holocaust.

This is what's going on right now in Africa, in Sudan."

And I show them a map of where it's taking place and everything.

And my kids, who never was interested in history the entire year was like, "Wait, that's going on now?

We need to do something about this."

>> Woman #2: It's about human rights.

It's about teaching them to stand up against discrimination everywhere, whether it is in the schoolyard where a child is mobbed or whether it is talking about the genocides that have happened in the past 10 to 20 years and are still happening.

So I think it is important, yes, and you as a teacher, you really need to be a person that's alert to this and that, you know, integrates that as much as he or she can.

>> George: It was a wonderful experience.

I wish we had more time with them.

This whole idea of tolerance, it's just -- it has to be a focus, because it's that fear factor.

You know, the minute people are afraid and they're -- they don't understand people, whether it's because of language or background or culture, then that's where that intolerance begins.

And you have to really address it when they're little, I think.

So, yeah, that's what I think I'll bring home, the biggest part.

>> Beatty: Truly a life-altering journey filled with lessons about prejudice and hatred, but also courage and determination and what it means to step up rather than stand by.

That message comes home when three of our teachers return to their classrooms.

♪♪ >> Cammarata: What about the idea of being an onlooker?

What is that definition to you, as opposed to an upstander?

Can you guys tell me the difference between the two?

>> Young woman: The people that don't stand up, they still care about the person.

It's just the people that stand up have more courage, I guess, to do it.

>> Cammarata: Right, so you want to see more people bring forth that courage.

My name is Mimma-Marie Cammarata, and I teach Italian here at Sterling.

It's very important for our students to see the connection between the various subjects that they study throughout the day.

In my Italian class, my students have learned excerpts from Primo Levi's materials and books.

And one of the things that he said is, "It happened.

Therefore, it can happen again."

What do you think is the most important lesson that we can learn?

>> Young woman #2: I think that they should just stop judging people for who they are because no matter what, they're a person, too.

>> Maunz: And so what's he doing to speak out about it?

I'm Lauren Maunz, and I teach physics and chemistry.

The Nazis did some horrific experiments.

And is it ethical to use the information that we gained through all of those experiments?

Like, is that right?

Should we profit from the horrible things that they did?

And that's some of the questions that science has to answer about the Holocaust.

>> Myers: I'm Michelle Myers.

I teach French.

What were your thoughts as you were going through this project?

>> Girl: I couldn't really fathom how people could have lost such the sense of humanity.

>> Myers: It's just not enough to teach the kids about the facts.

We have to teach them the big ideas.

So I'm bringing back that the kids have to be upstanders.

It's not enough to be an onlooker.

And I really want to make sure that our kids know what really happened, how did it happen, why did it happen, okay, why didn't more people help?

>> Matthew: Sharing a passion to make these questions relevant to their students, the teachers combined their classrooms.

Over the course of two weeks, students were challenged to connect lessons of the Holocaust to the world in which we live today.

Cammarata: People were taught to believe.

They were taught to hate.

So it's our job as your teachers to get you guys to believe in not hating each other, to believe in accepting people, to be as loud as you possibly can with positive thoughts, not negative thoughts.

>> Myers: And isn't this a wonderful opportunity to have conversations with those around you, be it your family, your friends, people that have hateful notions and feelings?

And maybe it's a time to just start conversations, okay?

Because it's really about relationships, isn't it?

So we're hoping that you take this message and go beyond this room with that message.

>> Matthew: Working in groups, students created projects, ranging from wearable messages... >> Girl #2: We don't want to forget all of the Jewish people, and others, that have died during this process.

>> Girl #3: We who could spread the word about the Holocaust... >> Matthew: ...to artwork... >> Girl #3: It's almost like we're worse than the people that killed them.

>> Matthew: ...to public-service announcements, each designed to educate their peers about the ongoing dangers of bigotry, hatred, and extremism, and then to reach as many people as possible with these lessons of the Holocaust.

>> Boy: Genocide is still in Darfur.

However, we must not forget the people lost.

We must work to end genocide in the future.

The forgotten many must not be forgotten.

>> Girl #4: So, as a tribute to the forgotten many, we've created an Instagram page where every day, we post the picture of a victim of the Holocaust and give a little bio of them and what their life was like, and how it unfortunately ended.

We've used this to further the education of how students can learn about the genocide.

>> Boy #2: During the '30s and into the '40s, into the war, people were discriminated against.

They weren't allowed to be themselves.

And we thought the best way to relate that to today's world was with the LGBT movement.

>> Girl #5: No matter where you are or who you are on this Earth, we all deserve to be treated the same.

>> Boy #3: And the main message we want to get today is to keep pulling yourself up, 'cause you can lift yourself up higher than anyone can pull you down.

Thank you.

>> Cammarata: Yes, it is one person that can make a difference, or a small group of people that can really, truly make a difference.

And if not, you can allow hate to infiltrate.

And it's important that they learn to be an upstander, as opposed to an onlooker.

♪♪ >> Beatty: As we heard earlier, that same message was one shared by Paul Winkler with thousands of students during his long career.

So now we remember a man who touched so many with his mission to raise genocide and Holocaust awareness.

We remember Paul Winkler.

>> Winkler: Like a teacher one time said to me, "Oh, Paul, everybody in my class can spell Holocaust."

I said, "Well, that's not really the most crucial thing.

What do they feel?

What do they care about?"

If you're prejudiced, just come up here.

But if you're not prejudiced, if you don't have any prejudice, go to the back room.

My feeling is that if we stop doing the efforts, I think we will be taken over with a tsunami of hate.

Thank you for being honest.

Liar, liar, liar.

[ Laughter ] Absolutely you have prejudice.

We all have it.

That's what Holocaust genocide education is about -- remembering the past and then helping the students become better people.

♪♪ We have to help our students understand they are part of a bigger world, they are not isolates on an island somewhere, that everything they do impacts someone else.

So we are our brother's keeper.

And for myself, I need to find the person that's gonna continue this kind of level.

Someday I'm gonna have to say, "It's time to sit back a little bit."

I thank you for the opportunity to share this.

♪♪ ♪♪ >> Beatty: Coming up, they are among the last generation to speak with Holocaust survivors.

But first, we're heading back to Sterling High School, featured on a recent installment of "Making the Grade," our series about how educators face the challenges of learning during the COVID pandemic.

>> Myers: The butterfly is the symbol of hope for the children of the Holocaust.

The crocuses are yellow, and when they blossom, they look a little bit like a Jewish star.

And they were to represent the stars that Jews were forced to wear during the Holocaust.

The purpose of the project was to bring awareness to the million and a half little Jewish children, and big Jewish children, who were killed during the Holocaust.

When the garden fell in disrepair and the border fell in disrepair, students wanted to do something, and they wanted to fix the border.

It was their idea to not only fix the border, but to move the garden to a more visible space.

>> Epright: At the same time that the crocus garden was moving over into a space, the student community began to talk about a reflection garden, what that is, could they go out there, could they go out there with their advisors, their clubs?

Would that be a space that we could utilize, or maybe students that didn't want to go to the cafeteria, maybe they were in conflict?

The garden has now morphed into a centerpiece.

We've created a flower bed.

We have pinwheels that designated in our Red Ribbon Week 1,300 deaths due by smoking, tobacco, vaping.

>> Myers: This equity and everything that's grown out of it has come from the idea of what happens when hate takes root and the horrible destruction and the loss of life, okay?

So it started with that to bring that attention, but it's morphed into something so positive.

>> Epright: School as we knew it, you know, times that they were together in the cafeteria, these treasured times, in our club meetings, they had times and places to meet their needs.

So this garden, I think, has been the lifeline, like the hope, like we're gonna get back to some place and some better place.

Myers: The garden represents hope that things will get better, and what a blessing that is.

>> Gross: My name is Ernie Gross.

I was born in Romania, and we were seven children.

I was the fourth.

>> Fitzpatrick: He told his story about his experience coming from Romania as a child... >> Gross: In April 1944... >> Fitzpatrick: ...and being brought to the concentration camps.

>> Gross ...two Hungarian police came and knocked on the door and they told us to get up.

>> Sidney: When he was speaking about his experiences to the students, I could see that it resonated with them.

>> Gross: ...you're out of the train, the commotion and the fear, You did not know what to do.

They told us stay... >> Sidney: They were listening to every word.

>> Gross: ...front of the line by the German Nazi and a German shepherd, and everybody had to go through him.

He is the one who made the decision that they who should live and who should die.

>> Brandi: I felt very sad.

In my opinion, I'm surprised I didn't cry, because every time I hear about the Holocaust, I feel very guilty, even though it wasn't my fault.

>> Gross: Even I already was getting weaker and weaker.

And when that happens, there is seven camps and they put you in Camp Seven.

Once you're in Camp Seven, this is the end of your destination.

This is the end of your life.

>> Fitzpatrick: To hear it from somebody who lived it and to hear it from somebody who experienced it close to their age absolutely leaves more of an impression on them.

I don't think this is something that they'll ever forget.

>> Gross: And I'm standing in this long, long line, and every couple of minutes, I was closer and closer.

Finally, I already saw the crematorium.

And I know in a half an hour everything's gonna be over.

>> Anjolie: He talked about how cruel they were to everybody.

>> Gross: And they will count from 1 to 10.

And whoever is 10, that person they will shoot.

>> Sidney: To have a Holocaust survivor come in and speak about his experiences -- it gives them a personal account to what really happened.

>> Gross: I turned around.

The American Jeep is full of soldiers at the gate.

That means I was liberated.

My whole purpose of talking, to forget what happened, and you have to try to forgive.

For years and years, I was looking to find the American soldier to thank him, that he liberated me, because an hour later, I would have been already gone.

It took me 60 years.

You have to forget what happened.

You have to forgive.

Then you can go on with your life.

>> Fitzpatrick: I think that was his key message, was to love and to be able to move forward with your life and to be kind and to love people for who they are and not where they came from, not what they've done, and to forgive, but not forget.

>> Gross: ...believing in God... >> Sidney: It is so important for the stories to be told, not to this generation, but generations after, because even in today's world, as my kids -- they were taught about the pyramid of hate and how easy it is to go up from one step to the next, and how a simple funny joke led to the genocide of a people.

>> Man: We have a responsibility to go back and not only speak to our family and friends about today, but I hope that this is something that we will take and we'll keep with us.

>> Fitzpatrick: When there's no more survivors to tell the story, these kids need to continue to tell the story so that when they tell the story to their children and to their grandchildren, that story lives on and on.

And nobody will forget what happened during the Holocaust.

>> Gross: Thank you very much.

>> Sidney: It's very important that they take what they learned and heard today with Mr.

Gross and incorporate it into their lives.

I teach them that every day in school.

Their parents hopefully are teaching them every day at home the power of forgiveness.

>> Zachary: Kids need to know what happened so something like this cannot happen again and to make sure you don't climb the pyramid of hate and just try to wipe out an entire culture of people.

>> Gross: I don't think it's a good idea to take revenge on somebody.

Somebody needs help.

If you're able to help, you have to help.

Once we help each other, life could be better for everybody.

It could happen to any type of people, the same thing.

So the lesson is get together along, to love each other and not to hate.

♪♪ >> Beatty: That's all for now.

We hope you enjoyed watching.

And we invite you to discover more by visiting our website, classroomcloseup.org, and searching the video library.

We'll be back with another episode next week, so please join us again on "Classroom Close-up, New Jersey."

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