Students from the College of Education joined peers from several other Kentucky colleges for a trip to Poland last summer to participate in The March of Remembrance and Hope, a memorial to the victims of the Holocaust. Their experience was the subject of a powerful new KET documentary, Remembrance: A Journey of Hope, which aired Monday evening, December 15, on KET1.

The March of Remembrance and Hope is a program of the March of the Living International, a Tel Aviv, Israel organization that educates youth around the world about the Holocaust. The purpose of the march is to teach students of different religious and ethnic backgrounds about the dangers of intolerance and to promote better relations among people of diverse cultures.

College of Education professors Jesus Garcia and Todd Savage coordinated the participation by UK students. It was the second time the College of Education has shared in the event. Two years ago, Dr. Garcia had organized another group of education students to play a part in the international march.

Twelve College of Education students and nine students from other UK programs such as the Patterson School of Diplomacy, were involved in the most recent program. Prior to the trip, students were required to attend five preparatory seminars and read several books about the Holocaust and other documented acts of genocide that occurred throughout the 20th century. In addition, students were required to prepare a project based on their experiences and related to their particular field of interest.

The students' studies were designed to help prepare them for the intellectual and emotional challenges they would face during their visits to the death camps, as well as for their responsibilities to continue sharing the lessons learned by their experience.

Much of the funding for this project came from Columbia Gas CEO Joe Kelley. Kelley, Dr. Garcia said, has an abiding interest in diversity issues, awareness of social injustices throughout the world and in promoting greater understanding among cultures. Much of the reason the College of Education has been involved in the March of Remembrance and Hope is due to Kelley’s support, he added.

The documentary was shot on location in Warsaw, Krakow and Lublin. It chronicles the student’s trip as they arrive in Poland and their visits to the various death camps, including Treblenka, Majdanek, and Auschwitz-Birkenau.

“Even though quite a bit of time has passed since these camps operated, they still retained a sense of these buildings being intrinsically bad. It was as if the horrors that had occurred there were marked indelibly into the mortar,” commented Aaron Hutchings, producer of the KET documentary special. In addition to the shots of the former death camps in the modern day, the film also features archived footage of the gas chambers and crematoria in operation during World War II. It will conclude with coverage of the March for Remembrance and Hope in Warsaw.

“It was obvious from the student’s expressions that this was an enlightening and life-changing experience for them,” said Dr. Savage following their return to Kentucky.