SCHOOL SPOTLIGHT: DEFOREST STUDENTS SPREAD THEIR STUDY OF GENOCIDES
By Pamela Cotant
Wisconsin State Journal
Apri l 13 2009
DEFOREST — Students in the New Reflections program of DeForest High
School not only tackled the wrenching subject of genocide, they put
on a symposium to let others know about the atrocities they researched.
The 20 juniors and seniors in DeForest’s alternative high school
program set up informational booths in the basement of the DeForest
Public Library, where their classes are held. They invited parents,
school staff members, School Board members and others to view their
displays and multimedia presentations.
"Most high schoolers are never in that position where they are the
experts," said alternative school teacher Jen McGorray. "They took
this project and ran with it and made it their own."
McGorray said the idea was to extend the traditional study of
the Holocaust by looking at other genocides. The students studied
genocides, a massacre and other human rights violations against the
Hmong, Cambodians, Congolese, Rwandans, Muslims in India in 2002,
Chechens, Kurds, Armenians, American Indians and Sudan and China.
Senior Jackie Holland and junior Crystal Pullen said it was difficult
to study the Nanjing, China massacre, finding it "disgusting" and
"gross."
"I didn’t even know about this," junior Eric Debrow said about studying
the killing of the Congolese with classmate Levi Bingham. "It affected
me because people were being killed for no reason."
The students also got lessons on research. Senior Michelle Schumacher
and junior Kate Wagner found it difficult to obtain information on
the violence against Muslims in India from books so they turned to
the Internet — but found that unreliable at times, too. Senior Ted
Waggoner, who studied events in Chechnya along with junior Nicole
O’Donnell, said he learned about propaganda and wasn’t sure if he
could trust everything he found on the Internet.
The genocide unit is being taught every other year by McGorray and
Michelle Kruse, who teaches 20th century history and literature at
New Reflections, along with English at the high school.
Research for the unit was funded by a grant obtained by McGorray,
Kruse and Lisa Aldrich, German teacher at DeForest High School. The
three went to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington
and a synagogue in the Milwaukee area, where they received curriculum
materials.