October 11, 2019 | 12 Tishrei 5780
Candlelighting 6:29 p.m. | Havdalah 7:25 p.m. | Vol. 62, No. 41 | pittsburghjewishchronicle.org
Baldwin teachers shine educational light on anti-Semitism
NOTEWORTHY LOCAL Surgeon visits from Africa
Remembering Jerry Rabinowitz
$1.50
Local Holocaust survivors featured in new photo exhibit By David Rullo | Staff Writer
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Between the students’ questions and the need to contextualize the atrocity within the broader history of anti-Semitism, Shaner decided to organize a daylong training for teachers. He reached out to Echoes & Reflections, an organization that provides secondary educators access to substantive Holocaust education. “There are not enough school disticts in the area that are doing a competent job of Holocaust education,” said Shaner. “We need more training if we’re going to do a better job.” Although area teachers continue to field individual inquiries related to the shooting, Echoes & Reflections took a larger approach to the topic by addressing educational strategies, such as integrating instructional enhancements, for teaching contemporary manifestations of anti-Semitism and Holocaust denial. “Teachers are on the front lines of having to help students kind of wrestle with and process experiences that are going on, violent experiences of all sorts,” said Lindsay Friedman, Echoes & Reflections’ managing
uigi Toscano’s lack of Holocaust education inspired his project “Lest We Forget.” “When I was 18, I was in school but didn’t have a good history teacher,” said the German-Italian photographer. “I had so many questions. I decided to travel alone to Auschwitz. I was very naive, thinking there was someone there that could give me answers to the questions I had, but there was no one. I remember standing in front of a mountain of shoes. That experience stayed with me a long time.” As the political climate in Germany and Europe changed, Toscano decided to do something to fight what he viewed as a growing sense of hate from the right. “In the beginning, it was very hard for me. Everyone said, ‘This was so long ago, forget it.’” Toscano persevered, and with a small amount of initial funding from the city where he lived, traveled to Austria, Israel, Ukraine, the United States and throughout Germany photographing Holocaust survivors. Those portraits have been exhibited in large public spaces, including outside of the United Nations in New York City, at the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool in Washington, D.C., and at Kansas City’s Memorial Courtyard at the National WWI Museum and Memorial. The Holocaust Center of Pittsburgh is bringing “Lest We Forget” to the University of Pittsburgh beginning Oct. 17 to commemorate the Oct. 27 shooting at the Tree of Life building. Unique to Pittsburgh will be 16 never-before-seen portraits of local Holocaust survivors, including two who recently died, Sam Gottesman and Herman Snyder.
Please see Baldwin, page 12
Please see Photos, page 12
LOCAL Pediatrician finds value in stillness
Michael Zilibowitz visits from Australia to offer insights about child development Page 3 NATIONAL ‘Notorious RBG’ comes to PA
An exhibit on the Supreme Court Justice opens at the National Museum of American Jewish History. Page 6
Harrison Middle School English teacher Daniel Shaner, center, organized last week’s workshop at Baldwin High School. Photo by Adam Reinherz By Adam Reinherz | Staff Writer
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ne year after last October’s shooting at the Tree of Life building, Baldwin area students still struggle with their community’s relationship to the crime. Kathy Hawk, a music teacher at J.E. Harrison Middle School and a graduate of Baldwin High School, explained that when it was discovered that the shooter had also graduated from Baldwin, students wanted to know whether she knew him. Hawk didn’t, but said his photo is in yearbooks from her era. Caitlin Caponi, an English, language arts and special education teacher at Brentwood Middle School and fellow Baldwin graduate, was similarly asked questions about the person who killed 11 Jews on Oct. 27, 2018. Students wanted to know “why does he hate?” and “why would he shoot people who were defenseless?” said Caponi. Daniel Shaner, a teacher at Harrison, covers the Holocaust in his English class. “It would be pretty hard for students” not to bring up the attack, he said. “This hit pretty close to home for some of them,” said Hawk.
Chabad House on Campus will honor University of Pittsburgh Chancellor Patrick Gallagher on October 26 during Homecoming Weekend. See ad on page 14.