Annie Wright's Yellow Tie senior class attended Pacific Lutheran University’s Annual Powell-Heller Conference for Holocaust Education today. The conference, now in its sixth year, took place March 13-March 15.

The theme of this year’s conference was “Empowerment,” and the goal was to give educators, students and members of the community a way to use the lessons of the Holocaust to empower themselves and others. The high school curriculum, designed by Annie Wright history teacher Bridgette McGoldrick and Charles Wright history teacher Nick Coddington, addressed issues such as identifying injustices and taking personal responsibility, and used resources developed by the Jewish Partisan Education Foundation. The program included breakout sessions on defiance and empowerment, a talk with Holocaust survivor Suzie Sherman, and a campus tour and discussion of the college process.

“Our aim was to provide students with an opportunity to grapple with ideas about this topic that both complement and contradict their own personal worldviews,” said Mrs. McGoldrick. “They hopefully left with a better understanding of the Holocaust, not only as an important historical event, but also as a part of the unfolding narrative of world history in the 21^st century context. Experiences like these, outside the classroom, ultimately provide history students with a better sense of how they can be active agents of change in their communities and the world.”