Appendix A:  Grant Documents

Abstract

            Western Washington University, and a consortium of teachers and school administrators from nearly a dozen school districts in three rural counties, request consideration of a Humanities Focus Grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities to support a series of Holocaust-Genocide Studies workshops to facilitate learning in rural Washington State schools.  Funds from this grant will be used to provide stipends for project personnel, consultants and participants, and to cover the costs for books, supplies, services and travel.
            The Northwest corner of Washington State is an area undergoing significant demographic and economic changes.  Incidents of backlash, growing intolerance and prejudice are occurring locally and appear to be increasing in frequency.  In the last two years alone, hate groups burned crosses in front of migrant housing in Whatcom County as well as in front of the home of a bi-racial couple in Skagit County.  The organizer of a Holocaust memoriam received several threatening telephone calls and had two trashcans full of broken glass dumped in his driveway.  A lesbian student at the Western Washington University was the object of a stone throwing assault. Neo-Nazi literature was mailed to nearly every graduating high school senior in Bellingham.  These incidents provide evidence of the intrusion of racist organizations and other hate groups into our area. 
            Believing that it was especially imperative that young people achieve a deeper understanding of the consequences of cultural ignorance, social intolerance, and violence motivated by bigotry, a group of public and private school teachers approached local university faculty requesting opportunities to immerse themselves in the study of relevant scholarly issues. They are especially interested in an intellectual study of the history of the use and misuse of power, the role of individuals and groups in confronting inhumanity, and tolerance of ethnic and cultural diversity.
            In light of the above, educators expressed the belief that teaching and learning about the Holocaust and other episodes of genocide may be of particular value for their students.  While larger population centers like Vancouver, Canada and Seattle, Washington do have resource centers that address many of these issues, the isolated nature of rural Northwest Washington present special challenges to educators.  The purpose of the proposed workshop, therefore, is to provide teachers with improved knowledge as well as access to interdisciplinary strategies for presenting Holocaust and genocide-related topics to an increasingly diverse constituency in their humanities, world language, English, and social studies classes.
            If the project is funded, a series of workshops will be scheduled over a 13-month period, beginning in October 1999 and ending in November 2000.  There will be a total of 10 workshops taught by seven university-level scholars and two Holocaust survivors.  These sessions will take place in seminar format.  Participants will be responsible for recording their experiences in written journals and will produce reports and reaction papers throughout the workshop.  The immediate result will be more effective integration of Holocaust– and genocide-related materials and issues into the curriculum.  We hope the long-term result will be knowledgeable teachers who can help their students to better understand human social behavior and that the workshops will serve as a model for confronting the potential for increased bigotry in rural Northwest Washington State.

Goals and Objectives, Central Issues

Goals and Objectives:  To achieve this purpose, public and private school teachers of the humanities, world languages, English and social studies from nearly a dozen school districts in three rural counties Northwest Washington State, working in concert with a university scholar, have organized a program designed to meet the following practical and theoretical objectives:

• Familiarize teachers with key issues in Holocaust and genocide studies and identify opportunities and methods for integrating Holocaust and genocide-related materials into curriculum effectively and appropriately.

• Identify sources available to enhance teacher effectiveness and to stimulate student learning and research.  These sources will include primary and secondary materials in various media:  film, literature, history, music, painting, etc.

• Develop effective interdisciplinary approaches to teaching the Holocaust and genocide and seek ways to explore common features among and parallels between past and current episodes of genocide.

Central Issues:  The purpose of this workshop is to provide teachers with approaches to integrating Holocaust and genocide-related topics into the curriculum, thus involving their students more effectively in related issues through the study of the humanities.  The staff and participants will work with scholars to become content knowledgeable while considering the interdisciplinary approaches and resources needed to present these issues to students in a changing rural setting.  To achieve this purpose, our project staff will address a variety of issues in Holocaust and genocide studies:

• the cases for and against drawing parallels between the Holocaust and other episodes of genocide;

• the strengths and limitations of using fiction, non-fiction and artwork in the study of the Holocaust and genocide;

• the lessons to be ascertained from Holocaust survivor testimony in the personal accounts of survivors;

• the courage/reasoning of those who risked their lives to save the oppressed, the fate of non-Jews in the Holocaust; and the role of non-Nazi perpetrators.