Among Prize Recipients: English teacher who created a website in memory of her mother, a Holocaust survivor, that includes information on Holocaust lesson plans; a book that tells the story of a Japanese teacher who chose to teach about the Shoah and ended up discovering new information about the life and fate of young Jewish victim; a French teacher who explored Jewish life in France before and during the Holocaust and then partnered with a community there to bring her students to France; and a Holocaust education center and museum established and guided by sixth graders in their own school

(November 5, 2006 – Jerusalem)  Tomorrow, November 6, 2006, Yad Vashem’s International School for Holocaust Studies will present its 2006 Prizes for Excellence in the Field of Holocaust Education. The ceremony will take place at 11:30 in the Yad Vashem Auditorium, in the presence of Education Minister Prof. Yuli Tamir, Chairman of the Yad Vashem Directorate Avner Shalev, and Director of the International School for Holocaust Studies Dr. Motti Shalem.  Participating in the ceremony will be the prizewinners, students, educators, donors’ family members and members of the Aloumim Association. 

Japanese teacher Fumiko Ishioka has flown in especially for the ceremony.  Requesting help from the Auschwitz Museum in creating a Holocaust remembrance program, Fumiko received a suitcase from the Museum on which was written “Hannah Brady, 16 May 1931, orphan.”  Teacher and students painstakingly pieced together the details of Hanna’s life, and discovered that she was a daughter of a family of artists from Czechoslovakia.  Hanna was interned in Terezin, and then deported to Auschwitz, where she was murdered at the age of 13.  Fumiko also discovered that Hanna had a brother, George, and was able to track him down in Toronto, Canada.  George and his daughter will also participate in the ceremony.  Fumiko’s quest is described in the book Hanna’s Suitcase (published by Shocken in Hebrew) by Karen Levine, which will receive the prize for Children’s Holocaust Literature. 

The prize for Outstanding Excellence in Holocaust Teaching will go to Marsha Goren, an English teacher at the Ein Ganim elementary school in Petach Tikvah.  Goren teaches about the Holocaust through the story of her late mother Sonia Frenkel, a survivor of Majdanek and Auschwitz.  Sixth grade students at Ein Ganim study the story through a special website (www.globaldreamers.org/index) developed by Goren, and add their families’ stories as well.  Through the website, Goren’s students have a dialogue with contemporaries in 32 schools around the world. 

The prize for Outstanding Educational Project will go to the Mevo’ot Elementary School in Be’er Tuvia. The School begins teaching about the Holocaust in early grades, and for this purpose established a museum called “For Remembrance,” in which sixth-grade students act as guides for children and adults who visit the museum.

The prize for Outstanding Educational Program will go to the Manor Kabri Middle School, Kibbutz Eilon, Roni Weinberg, Principal, for the school’s interdisciplinary program on the Holocaust, which spans two years, and features extensive teacher-student cooperation.    

2006 Prize Recipients

Outstanding Educational Project, donated by Chuno and Blima Najmann Foundation:  Mevo’ot Elementary School, Be’er Tuvia, for the establishment of the museum and educational center.

Outstanding Educational Curriculum, donated by the Chuno and Blima Najmann Foundation: Manor Kabri Middle School, Kibbutz Eilon, for their interdisciplinary program on the Holocaust.

Excellence in Holocaust Teaching, donated by the Chuno and Blima Najmann Foundation: Marsha Goren, Ein Ganim Elementary School, Petach Tikvah, on her Holocaust education website

Children’s Holocaust Literature, donated by the Bruno Brandt Foundation: Hanna’s Suitcase by Karen Levine (published by Shocken).

Outstanding Matriculation Paper on the Holocaust, donated by the Luba and Mark Uveeler Foundation:  Hanna Koptz (mentor: Orit Margaliot).

Outstanding Term Paper on the Family During the Holocaust, donated by the Foundation in Memory of the Members of the Golderbitter and Gifman Families Who Perished in the Holocaust, Established by Many and Gershon Bergson: Talia Kirsh.

Outstanding Matriculation Papers on the History of the Jews in France during the Holocaust, donated by the Fondation pour la Memoire de la Shoah and the Aloumim Association: Eliur Cohen (mentor: Dr. Alain Michel).