enocide_07-13-07_7T6BQQB.33a2105.html

Educator is honored for teaching about genocide

01:00 AM EDT on Friday, July 13, 2007
By Stu Woo
Journal Staff Writer

Robert C. Petrucci Jr., a social-studies teacher at East Greenwich
High School, was named the first recipient of the Genocide Educators
Award last month at a ceremony in the Columbus Theatre, in Providence.

The award is sponsored by Rhode Island’s Armenian National Committee
and Armenian Martyrs’ Memorial Committee. It includes a $500 prize.

Petrucci, who said he teaches what he believes is the first
high-school level course in the state solely devoted to genocide, said
he hopes he can help spread the curriculum to other schools.

"I will certainly give any teacher in the state any help that they
want," Petrucci said. "One of the best things you can do as a teacher
is to share the things you develop."

Cranston City Council President Aram Garabedian, who presented
Petrucci the award, introduced a bill in 2000, when he was a state
representative, that made teaching about genocide a part of the
state-approved curriculum. Garabedian said he couldn’t be happier that
Petrucci was chosen for the honor.

"He’s made wonderful contributions to the curriculum," Garabedian
said. "He is so enthusiastic and committed, and for someone who
doesn’t even have ancestry in Armenian genocide, it makes it so much
better than he’s taking it to heart to educate so many people."

Petrucci said he teaches one class about genocide each semester. His
class discusses the Holocaust and genocides in Armenia, Bosnia, Darfur
and Rwanda. At the end of the semester, students make a presentation
to a mock U.S. Senate Committee on Foreign Relations on how to stop
genocide.

swoo@projo.com