Educators: Workshop for Educators and The Gedalyah Engel Education Award

Workshop for Educators

Tuesday, April 14, 4:30PM - 8:00 PM
Purdue University Discovery Learning Center

The Discovery Learning Center is located on S. Martin Jischke Dr. View the campus map here (search for DLR).

Registration Now Open

The theme for the 2015 Greater Lafayette Holocaust Remembrance Conference Educator Workshop is Life in a Jar. Our guests this year are Jack Mayer, author of the award-winning book Life in a Jar, the story of Holocaust rescuer and Nobel Prize nominee, Irena Sendler, and Norm Conard, the Director of the Life in a Jar Project.

During the workshop, Jack Mayer and Norm Conard, the social studies teacher who inspired his students to investigate Irena Sendler for their History Day Project, will tell the unforgettable story of Irena’s rescue of 2,500 Jewish children from Warsaw during the Holocaust. All workshop participants will receive a copy of Life in a Jar, the DVD The Courageous Life of Irena Sendler, and a packet of related teaching materials.

PGP Points

Certificates for 3 PGP points will be available to participants to submit to their districts. District policies differ. Please ask your administrator if this workshop qualifies.

Registration

Participation is free of charge and a light dinner will be provided complements of Subway.

To register, email Asta Balkute at the Ackerman Center for Democratic Citizenship at Purdue University, (abalkute at purdue dot edu). Please indicate your meal preference (vegetarian or non) and your interest in receiving a PGP certificate.

Space is limited, so register early and please forward this information to interested educators.

Sponsors

The workshop is funded by the Ackerman Center for Democratic Citizenship at Purdue University.
Dinner provided by Subway, Bauer Inc.

Book Description: Life in a Jar

During World War II, Irena Sendler, a Polish Catholic social worker, organized rescue network of fellow social workers to save 2,500 Jewish children from certain death in the Warsaw ghetto. Incredibly, after the war her heroism, like that of many others, was suppressed by communist Poland and remained virtually unknown for 60 years. Unknown, that is, until three high school girls from an economically depressed, rural school district in southeast Kansas stumbled upon a tantalizing reference to Sendler's rescues, which they fashioned into a history project, a play they called Life in a Jar. Their innocent drama was first seen in Kansas, then the Midwest, then New York, Los Angeles, Montreal, and finally Poland, where they elevated Irena Sendler to a national hero, championing her legacy of tolerance and respect for all people. Life in a Jar: The Irena Sendler Project is a Holocaust history and more. It is the inspirational story of Protestant students from Kansas, each carrying her own painful burden, each called in her own complex way to the history of a Catholic woman who knocked on Jewish doors in the Warsaw ghetto and, in Sendler's own words, "tried to talk the mothers out of their children." Inspired by Irena Sendler, they are living examples of the power of one person to change the world and models for young people everywhere. (from Amazon)

Written by featured speaker Jack Mayer. View his biography here.

DVD Description: The Courageous Life of Irena Sendler

The story of Irena Sendler, a social worker who was part of the Polish underground during World War II and was arrested by the Nazis for saving the lives of nearly 2,500 Jewish children by smuggling them out of the Warsaw ghetto. imdb.com

Gedalyah Engel Education Award

The Greater Lafayette Holocaust Remembrance Committee is proud to announce the recipients of the 2015 Gedalyah Engel Education Award:

Mary Eisert (Wea Ridge Middle School):
Funds to expand the library for the Holocaust Book Club that she started last year. It has grown from 10 students to 25 and she can’t keep them in books! She will also take field trips to CANDLES and to the Illinois Holocaust Museum in Skokie.

Ann Hammons (Harrison High School):
Funds to take 200 students (two groups—one this spring and one next year) to CANDLES in Terre Haute as the culminating event in a study of Night.

Stella Schafer (McCutcheon High School):
Funds for travel expenses to Washington DC to take part in the Belfer Conference at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum.

Educators interested in applying for an Engel Award should contact Sarah Powley, Co-Chair of the GLHRC. The window for submitting proposals will open in the fall. Applications will be due January 31, 2016.

A grant opportunity for area educators for projects that address issues related to genocide, discrimination, bullying, human rights, the Holocaust or lessons to be learned from the Holocaust.

Apply for funding, for example, to:

A total of $2000 will be awarded to individuals or teams of educators currently teaching in schools in Tippecanoe or contiguous counties.

Education Award Flyer (PDF file)
Education Award Application Details (PDF file)