Isabel Lawrence
News Editor
Every year, the Holocaust & Human Rights Education Center presents an educator in the New York/Connecticut area with the Susan J. Goldberg Memorial Teacher Award. This award, meant to honor the late Ms. Goldberg, is given to the teacher who best educates their school and community about the Holocaust and other human rights violations. This year, NCHS’s Christine Bonarrigo has won the award for her work in creating and teaching the Literature of the Holocaust class at the high school.
Ms. Bonarrigo was teaching sophomores when her class read the book Night by Elie Wiesel, a survivor’s account of the Holocaust. Because so many students were interested in the book, Ms. Bonarrigo saw the need for a course focusing specifically on the Holocaust. “The sophomores had so many questions about that book after it was over, I really thought there was a need for another course, a course about the whole issue,” she said.
With the goal of furthering Holocaust education by using literature of the timer period and first hand accounts of survivors, Ms. Bonarrigo started the Literature of the Holocaust course, which seniors can take as an elective. “In 2008, I created the course, and it was approved by the English department and the administration, and we started in 2009,” she said. “The 2009-2010 school year, we had one class, as I recall it was one class with 25 students in it. Today, 2013, we now have four classes a year, close to a hundred students going through.”
Heidi D’Acosta, head of the English department, has seen the growing popularity of the Literature of the Holocaust course. “I think part [of its popularity]is the topic, and part of it is the way she runs the class,” Ms. D’Acosta said. “It’s unique in the sense that it’s not built like an interdisciplinary course like American Studies, but it really is interdisciplinary. The other part is that she does a lot of hands on work. If you walk into her classroom, you’ll see the projects that students create, quilts and oil paintings, so I think kids like that.”
According to Ms. D’Acosta, another aspect of the course that interests students is the study of varying points of view held by those involved in the Holocaust. “She felt it was very important to construct a course that had multiple viewpoints, that it wasn’t just focused on the concentration camp experience, but survivors, people who helped people escape, even Nazi viewpoints,” Ms. D’Acosta said.
Ms. Bonarrigo believes that in using varying accounts from the time period, students are able to learn more than they would in a traditional history class. “They’re getting full emotion from reading these particular types of pieces. They’re getting much more than a textbook blurb could give them,” Ms. Bonarrigo said. “It’s all historically based, but they’re getting to see how people navigated during that war, emotionally, psychologically, physically.”
These unique perspectives also appealed to members of the Holocaust & Human Rights Education Center. “I was on [the Center’s]radar because I was on the radar of the Jewish Historical Society of Stamford,” Ms. Bonarrigo said. “The Jewish Historical Society in Stamford was alerted to this class and the head of it visited me back in 2009 or 10. The year after, she brought four retired teachers from that or- ganization to come watch me teach the class. I guess they were impressed, and that’s how I was on their radar.”
The Center was impressed, recognizing Ms. Bonarrigo with the award on Thursday, Apr. 18 at 7:30 p.m. Ms. Bonarrigo is the second teacher from Connecticut to have won the award, as well as the second English teacher to have won in the 11 years the award has been given. “It’s an overwhelming feeling,” she said. “I’ve had a passion for this area of literature for a while, and this to me is just a wonderful feeling. You know you’re doing the right thing when you see remarks and actions coming from your class that are extremely positive. But it’s nice to know that other people may have seen that, too.”
To read Ms. Bonarrigo’s acceptance speech, see below.
Thank you Mr. Goldberg and members of the Holocaust and Human Rights Center. Thank you , Eva Weller and your colleagues from The Jewish Historical Society in Stamford. I’d like to thank my colleagues from the New Canaan School District: Dr. Mary Beth Wilson, Heidi D’Acosta and Dr. Rossella Fanelli. I am so grateful for your support. And, finally, I would like to thank my family who have come from near and far to be here tonight.
I would like to start with some words about this award. Susan Goldberg was a remarkable person, a model English teacher and a forward-looking advocate for human rights. She fearlessly took steps to enlighten those around her. This award urges others to follow in her footsteps. Her passion could be found in the words of Sonia Weitz, author of the memoir I Promised I Would Tell:
Come, take this giant leap with me
Into the other world…the other place
Where language fails and imagery defies,
Denies man’s consciousness…and dies
Upon the altar of insanity.
I believe I have taken that same “giant leap”as Susan did. In fact it was my fate to do so.
As a young child raised in a Bronx Jewish/Italian neighborhood , I saw first-hand a survivor from the Holocaust who lived next door to us, revealing engraved numbers from a horrible past life . My progressive schooling allowed me to attend The National Council of Christians and Jews while attending one of the Marymount high schools and to study Judaism @ Manhattanville College. My graduate work @ Fordham taught me that the Jesuit motto”Men For Others” was not just a saying but a duty. And I did so through my teaching.
Teaching English has been my passion since 1973. Analyzing a book’s nuances teaches a class to look at life in a variety of ways. Student’s get to think, connect, synthesize ideas. Teaching Weisel’s Night truly gave my students a look at the ugly side of humanity. It became a life lesson. I taught it yearly and each time it was the same. There were questions. Many questions. And I wanted to do more to answer these puzzled children. I received my chance while teaching at New Canaan High School in New Canaan, CT. Once again Night was the chosen book for sophomores and once again the questions arose. This time I sat down and created a new class, a class that would delve deeply into survivor memoir and primary sources of World War II, a class that would expose the Holocaust in all its ugliness and expose human nature as well…both good and bad. A class that would make connections between the past and the present. This would be a class for seniors to open their ears and eyes as they step into adulthood and the Literature of the Holocaust was going to be the teaching tool. The class was created and approved in 2008, and started in 2009 with one class of 26 students. Today NCHS has four LOH classes, serving close to 300 students to date. Another teacher, my mentee, has joined my ranks and teaches some of the sections. I have heard from former students who have decided to major in Holocaust studies. I have had students return for new book lists. I have had parents ask for an additional copy of a book to be sent home for them to read as well.
The questions are being answered. The eyes are being opened and the ears are listening. The work is continuing. And an unforgettable scar from history is the teaching tool, helping young people examine the current state of human rights in our world today. I have taken Susan Goldberg’s lead and that “giant leap” in teaching our students. In the words of Irena Gut Opdyke, one of the Righteous Among Nations,…who wrote the book In My Hands it is “for the young people, who can accomplish the impossible and can achieve greatness by finding the strength in God and in the goodness of the human spirit. I…encourage them to find hope and strength within themselves. Courage is a whisper from above: when you listen with your heart, you know what to do and how and when.”
I am so honored receiving this award. I will follow Susan Goldberg’s example
Thank you all.
