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For 10 days this past October, Nick Coddington, a history teacher at the private Charles Wright Academy in Tacoma and a retired senior NATO intelligence officer, led 12 of his students to Swidnik, Poland, as the first Americans to participate in the annual Holocaust Remembrance Week with teens from Belgium, the Netherlands, Hungary, and Italy.
Coddington teaches his freshmen classes about the Holocaust by matching photos of his students’ families with photos of victims of the Holocaust – two families at the beach, riding horses or having dinner. He asks the students to write an essay about the similarities they see between their own family and the one in the old picture. Then, together, they begin to research what happened to that family.
Working with the Washington State Holocaust Education and Resource Center, Coddington created a curriculum that covers genocides in Armenia, Russia, Cambodia, Bosnia, Rwanda and Darfur, as well as the Holocaust. But it was the opportunity to take his students to the site of such a tragedy that most resonated with him, and led him to go on to take his students to visit the site of several concentration camps in person.
“You can study the Holocaust every day of your life, but when you stand at the gates of Auschwitz, it’s an overwhelming experience,” says Coddington.
After the trip, several of the Polish students who had hosted the teens from Charles Wright made a visit to the South Sound to learn about living in the United States.
Later this month, Coddington will fly to New York to be honored by The Jewish Foundation for the Righteous with the Robert I. Goldman Award, presented annually to one teacher who demonstrates excellence and creativity in the field of Holocaust education.
Below are the impressions from some of Coddington’s students and their parents.
“I am simply astonished at the fact that I even had the opportunity to visit such monumental places. To think that I am part of the last generation that will get the chance to meet living Holocaust survivors, and, in the same month, visit two of the most impactful death camps is absolutely unbelievable. Holding hands around the memorial at Majdanek gave off such an energy, something that cannot be explained. All of us were, for one moment, a part of a whole, coming together in peace and serenity, with a silent understanding and appreciation that cannot be described in words. It was simply amazing.”
— Senior Megan Johnson, University Place
“I never really understood why stories surrounding the Holocaust interested me as a young person, but as a parent I began to understand. Only by continuing the dialog about the atrocities that happened during that time could we hope to prevent such a thing from reoccurring.
We talked endlessly to Alex as we prepared for the trip, about cultures and peoples and differences and acceptance and values and morals and all the things we as parents have held on to as we have brought up our boys. And we sent him off and held our breath.
He talked about the kids from the other countries he met and the friendships formed in the short time he was there. I realized how he had begun to see how a simple thing like friendship could be the basis for beginning to think about tolerance and justice, to break down stereotypes and preconceived ideas….and in his quiet way I hoped he held the thoughts, the seeds for thinking that in time would grow into strong views on topics concerning all the things he felt and saw during his trip.”
— Elizabeth King, mother of junior Alex King, University Place
“Being in the travel business, I send many people to Germany and Poland to visit the concentration and death camps. I’ve had clients come back and tell me how chilling and profound it is to be there standing in the very place that history happened. When I got an opportunity to go myself, I was more than excited. Not only for myself, but for my daughter, who would also get a chance to meet kids from other walks of life and parts of Europe.
What meant [the] most to my daughter was meeting her Polish host and staying with the family. She found that even though they live an entirely different life from us, it was still a good life. She felt an immediate bond with the girl as well as all the kids involved. It was that bond that led our kids to spearhead the program to bring the Polish kids over. I was skeptical at first that this would ever happen, but to my surprise, they pulled it off.
My daughter’s grandfather got involved with our venture to bring these kids over because he was also a victim of the war, being from Prussia, and moved by the German soldiers. He had many stories to share with Madeleine. She enjoyed listening to him because it made her more aware of what the Polish people went through during the war.”
— Kim Johnston, mother of junior Madeleine Johnston, Steilacoom
“We read several books and watched several movies about the Holocaust before we went, as well as met personally with two Holocaust survivors, one who survived Auschwitz, and one who survived Sobibor. That preparation set the groundwork for what we were going to hear and see. It did not, however, dampen the intensity of being there in person and seeing and hearing first hand what transpired during the Holocaust.
In Lublin, we had a British tour guide who was an expert on Operation Reinhardt. We felt as though we had a unique ‘behind-the-scenes’ tour of the city. That glimpse into what happened was chilling. Two days later we visited Auschwitz and Birkenau and learned about the ‘living’ conditions at the concentration camps.
We and our kids will never forget this trip. Our kids formed very strong bonds with their Polish hosts. While our hosts, for the most part, didn’t have nearly the ‘stuff’ we all take for granted, our kids did not want to leave, and the Polish kids formed a human chain to prevent our bus from leaving! We all learned how much we have in common and that we have to stand together to prevent something like this from happening again.”
— Kimberly Ellwanger, mother of junior Kate Ellwanger, Olympia