Holocaust Education
Our Vision
It was only one generation ago, that six million Jews lost their lives in a horrific cataclysm of deception and complicity. We as the ICCA through our interactive cultural exchanges at Yad Vashem, the Tennessee Whitwell Paper Clips Holocaust Museum, and our related projects, are raising up an army of teenage ambassadors from Canada, America, and Israel who are relationally integrated, purposefully informed and committed to standing with Israel and the Jewish people.
The Whitwell Paper Clip Story
In 1998,
In 1998, when learning about the holocaust, an eight grade student in rural Tennessee student asked a question. Her teacher taught that 6 million Jews had died as a result of the Holocaust, but he couldn't quite comprehend a number so big.
a student asked a question,
"How much is 6 million?", she asked, so together teacher and students hatched a plan to collect 6 million of something as a class. "Even if we only collect 2 thousand of something, we can see how much that is and have a better understanding of the number 6 million.", she thought.
and came up with a plan
The students discovered that paper clips were the perfect object to collect. They were worn by the Jewish people as a symbol of resistance during WWII, and they were originally created by a Jewish person, so they came up with a plan to collect paper clips. Now twenty years later they have collected over thirty million paper clips as a monument to the 6 million Jews who had lost their lives during the Holocaust.
that started a movement.
Not only did donations of paper clips to pour in from around the world, but two U.S. Presidents as well as hollywood represnatives, visiting to the school by holocaust survivors, international journalists and diplomats, and above all the purchase of an original German rail
car used for the transportation of Jews doomed for the death camps. all of which ultimately culminated in the creation of The Children’s Holocaust Memorial and the documentary film Paper Clips. In Whitwell Tennessee.
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Yad Vashem - Jerusalem
A part of our value to Holocaust Education was bringing the teens from our Friendship Tour 2018 to Yad Vashem in Jerusalem. Before the kids walked through the Holocaust Museum, two of our teens attending the tour from Israel told their families' story of their great-grandparents personal experience surviving the Holocaust. It became a personal experience for all involved as the realization set in that their new friends from Israel's survival was a miracle through the strength and perseverance of their grandparents and many others, and the tragedy that so many other dear people were lost, and the miracle of their ability to make a new home and life in Israel.
One of our teenagers testimony of her experience in Yad Vashem:
"It’s hard to put this experience into words. It was like no other and to walk through the museum with a group of Israelis and Americans, to be a representation of unity after proclaiming to be a Christian and to see what I believe in to have had such a huge hand in one of the worst tragedies in history is so incredible and humbling to me.
Everyone I met and bonded with over those ten days have made an impact on my daily life for as long as I live due to their love, acceptance, forgiveness, joy, and more.
This museum is very emotional and the stories I read will always be in my heart like a baby named Richard who was taken away from his mom at two years old while she pleaded for his life over her own and husband’s.
I don’t stand with the Christians that played a role in the Holocaust, it was a very distorted image of God and a false representation of Christians.
I stand with Israel and I truly learned their culture through real connections and history and by not letting the stereotypes or media affect my mind and experience."
- Bailey Kehoe, Nova Scotia, Canada
Where do we go from here?
Our ICCA Partner Museum in Israel
Over the course of the three years of camp interaction and through our sister city efforts. Our partners in Israel have purchased a replica train car now siting in our partner city in Israel. All parties have met on more than one occasion and have agreed on an artifact exchange. If you have any interest in this project please contact us.
