23 May 2019
In November 2018, Kirkham Grammar School Lower Sixth Form pupils, Koko Taylor and Abby Millward travelled to Krakow for the day to visit Auschwitz-Birkenau. An early start and a late finish, with a whirlwind tour in the middle gave for a full day of discovering the facts of the Holocaust and reflecting on the atrocities that occurred. Prior to the visit of the death camp, the girls had travelled to Manchester to meet with a survivor and talk about their expectations. The visit day was both physically and emotionally exhausting but one the girls felt passionate about. As witnesses to the events and as ambassadors of the Holocaust Educational Trust, the girls were duty bound to disseminate their testimony to others and pass on the lessons from Auschwitz.
Yesterday, the girls visited a Third Year RPE class to do just this. To complement the teaching of the Holocaust, both Koko and Abby took a lesson, where they talked about their experiences, their thoughts about the visit, showed pictures and held a discussion with the class. Finally, they explained to the class that several years ago in 2013, two previous ambassadors of the Holocaust Educational Trust, Rachel Howard and Savannah Des Etages, had created a structure that is currently at the entrance to the Waite Building, where pupils can write their hope for the world on a padlock and lock it onto the structure. Koko and Abby purchased locks for the class and asked the pupils to add to the structure. This lesson was very much appreciated by the Third Year pupils and some interesting thoughts were locked onto the structure.
