The English Montreal School Board is pleased to be facilitating a Holocaust Education Program.

For the 2022-23 academic year, this project was funded via  a grant from the Jewish Community Foundation of Montreal.

Activities focused on sensitizing students and staff to the history of the Holocaust and acts of Antisemitism via special guests, lectures and visits to the Montreal Holocaust Museum and different exhibits and programming in the community.

The EMSB looks forward to continue working with the following organizations: The Montreal Holocaust Museum, the Azrieli Foundation’s Holocaust Survivor Memoirs Program, the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs (CIJA), the Foundation for Genocide Education, B’nai Brith Canada and our team  of teachers and spiritual and community animators.

In 2004, the EMSB received a small grant for this purpose from the JCF. Working with spiritual animators, we arranged some successful programming.

In 2006, we  engaged in a fundraising campaign to honour the memory of Giovanni Palatucci, an Italian policeman who was arrested and died in Dachau for his anti-Nazi activities.  Yad Vashem, Israel’s Holocaust Memorial, had named him a Righteous Among the Nations , for rescuing Jews. We placed a plaque at the Wagar Adult Education Centre, as well as a large scale ceremony/lecture and arranged exchanges between students at Bialik High School in Côte Saint-Luc and Laurier Macdonald High School in St. Leonard.

For several years we worked with the Riva and Thomas O. Hecht, Teaching of the Holocaust for Educators during which time teachers were awarded scholarships to study the Holocaust in Jerusalem and Washington and then integrate that experience into their classroom curriculums.

Over the years, a variety of programs related to this subject have been carried out by spiritual animators.

The EMSB has  declared May as Jewish Heritage Month and works directly with the Azrieli Foundation’s Holocaust Survivor Memoirs Program to also bring the topic of the Holocaust to classrooms across our network.

Antisemitism and Holocaust denial is regrettably on the rise. In the spring of 2021, hostilities in Israel poured over to North America with acts of violence occurring here in Montreal. How do we educate today’s youth about the Holocaust, the myths and facts about antisemitism and the challenges the State of Israel faces?  Through outreach. Our goal is to sensitize thousands of students in the youth and adult sector to these realities.

We are seeking financial support from donors in order to ensure the continuation of this initiative.