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Oakcrest High School students recently visited the United States
Memorial Holocaust Museum in Washington, D.C. Ninety juniors in US
History II classes and eight chaperones attended. OHS History Teacher
Doug Cervi organized the trip.
Cervi wanted
the students to see the artifacts from the Holocaust and to listen
to survivor testimonies. “It’s a good concluding
experience for the students having studied the Holocaust and other
genocides,” Cervi commented.
OHS junior Devon Palermo commented, “I was really excited to go on this
trip, but at the same time I was nervous because I knew it was going to be
hard to handle. I don’t think many people can fully, or even partly,
grasp the horror of the Holocaust without becoming more educated in it, viewing
artifacts, and listening to testimonies from that time.”
Since its dedication in 1993, the Museum has attracted nearly 30 million visitors.
This may be because it offers over 12,700 artifacts, 46 million pages of archives,
over 80,000 historic images, and more than 995 hours of archival footage. The
museum’s mission statement asserts, “The Museum’s primary
mission is to advance and disseminate knowledge about this unprecedented tragedy;
to preserve the memory of those who suffered; and to encourage its visitors
to reflect upon the moral and spiritual questions raised by the events of the
Holocaust as well as their own responsibilities as citizens of a democracy.”
After visiting the museum, the students enjoyed lunch at Union Station. They
left Washington bound for the Baltimore waterfront where they visited the National
Aquarium followed by shopping and dinner.
For more information, contact:
Darlene Kopania, Journalism Department
Oakcrest High School
909-2631
Student Contact: Jen Pilallis
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