UP FRONT
Schools Are Evaluating
Local Holocaust Package
ALAN HITSKY
Associate Editor
T
he high school Holocaust Cur-
riculum Project initiated last
fall by the Center for the
Study of the Child in Farmington
Hills is now being evaluated by 54
high schools, ten school districts, five
colleges and universities and ten
religious schools throughout the
country.
While many of the 18-lesson
master texts, videotapes and student
texts are being used by local school
districts, curriculum sets have also
been requested by schools in New
York, Connecticut, Virginia, Ten-
nessee, Nebraska and Ontario. "We
have great interest in Canada;' said
project coordinator Peter Nagourney,
"and the curriculum is also being con-
sidered in Ohio for what may be a
state-wide program."
A sampling of area districts which
are currently using or evaluating the
curriculum include: Bloomfield Hills,
Berkley, Royal Oak, Farmington,
Ferndale, Oak Park, Rochester,
Southfield, Troy, Walled Lake and
West Bloomfield. Sets are also being
studied at Cranbrook, Detroit Coun-
try Day, Cass Tech, Hazel Park,
Clarenceville and temples Beth El
and Emanu-El.
Nagourney and curriculum
authors Dr. Sidney Bolkosky, Betty
Rotberg Ellias, and Oakland Schools'
Dr. David Harris have been working
to spread word of the new educational
tool, attending meetings and seeking
endorsements. More than 4,200 an-
nouncements advertising the cur-
riculum have been mailed.
Nagourney is also considering placing
the curriculum with a California
distributor in order to more easily
reach a wider high school audience.
Representatives of the Center for
the Study of the Child will meet with
leaders of the American Jewish Con-
gress in New York this month, seek-
ing an endorsement for the cur-
riculum, and are continuing fundrais-
ing activities to offset $250,000 pro-
duction costs.
With more than 20 Holocaust cur-
ricula available in the United States,
endorsements can be very political.
But the curriculum has received the
stamp of approval from the education
director of the U.S. Holocaust
Memorial Council, the director of the
International Center for Holocaust
Studies of the Anti-Defamation
League of B'nai B'rith, and several
Holocaust scholars.
Nobel Prize winner Elie Wiesel
was asked to review the curriculum
when he visited Detroit in December.
He told the curriculum sponsors that
he would give them an answer this
winter, adding that "education is the
key" lesson of the Holocaust. At the
same time, the executive board of the
Children of Holocaust Survivors
Association in Michigan gave the new
educational tool their blessing.
However, a requested endorse-
ment from Detroit's Holocaust
Memorial Center did not materialize.
HMC director Rabbi Charles H.
Rosenzveig told The Jewish News
that the HMC "simply is not in the
business of making endorsements. We
are simply not geared to making
evaluations with 26 different cur-
Continued on Page 16
The New Year is full for Riva Livshits, Wina Zusis, Miriam Lemberg and Soya Giefman.
Center's New Year Dance
Welcomes Soviet Seniors
Some 85 recent Soviet im-
migrants marked the New Year in
their new land last Sunday,
celebrating their freedom at a special
party at the Jimmy Prentis Morris
Jewish Community Center in Oak
Park.
The two-hour program of dancing
and refreshments was sponsored by
the Center, the Detroit Federation of
Musicians and the Area Agency on
Aging. The party was for older im-
migrants — "in their 50s to their 80s"
— to make them more comfortable in
their new home, according to the
Center's Diane Sands.
"Many of the newcomers are feel-
ing honiesick," said Sands. "After all,
they have been uprooted from their
old homes." She said the New Year's
dance was one of a series of events
designed for the Russians, many of
whom take English classes at the
Center. Sands is planning a monthly
current events group, led by
Americans fluent in RUssian, to give
a U.S. interpretation of the news.
But Sunday was time for a party,
with the seniors dancing to the music
of a four-piece orchestra led by Sam
Barnett, playing Fiddler, traditional
Russian and American dance music,
and horas.
'ROUND UP
Hitler's Art
Sparks Protest
Louisville, Ky. (JTA) — A
watercolor Adolf Hitler
painted in Vienna in 1910
was sold for $36,000 at a New
Year's Day auction, the World
Jewish Congress reported.
The sale triggered an angry
but peaceful demonstration
by some 25 people against
"the celebration of an evil
man who's well known for his
mass murder, not well known
for his art."
The 9-by-15-inch painting,
signed by Hitler, depicts a
church, a bridge and a horse-
drawn carriage in old Vienna.
It was auctioned by the Den
of Steven 'Gallery, which ob-
tained it from a retired Ford
Motor Company executive
who insisted on remaining
anonymous. The purchaser
was Dr. Donald Wright, a
Louisville physician.
The protest was organized
by J. Mary Sorrell of the New
Jewish Agenda.
Ethiopia Vries
20 Jews: Tsur
Tel Aviv (JTA) — Ethiopia
put about 20 Jews on trial
last month for their involve-
ment in attempting to im-
migrate to Israel, Israeli Im-
migration and Absorption
Minister Yaacov Tsur said
Monday.
His comments were
reported in the newspaper
Maariv, which added that
nothing more is known of
their fate. Thur said that most
of the defendants had worried
relatives in Israel.
The estimated 10;000 to
20,000 Jews who remain in-
Ethiopia are prohibited by
the government from
emigrating. About 16,000
Ethiopian Jews have come to
Israel, according to Tsur,
while 11,000 remain behind.
He also noted that about
28,000 Jews remain in Iran,
4,500 in Syria and about
1,000 in Yemen.
Soviet Exits
Up In 1987
New York (JTA) — More
than 8,000 Jews emigrated
from the Soviet Union during
1987, a nine-fold increase
over the 914 Jews who were
permitted to leave in 1986,
and the largest amount since
1981, when 9,500 Soviet Jews
emigrated.
But Soviet Jewry activist
groups expressed disappoint-
ment over the figure, noting
that in the year in which
"glasnost" was introduced the
number of Jewish emigres
comprised only a small frac-
tion of the 400,000 Soviet
Jews who wish to emigrate.
Pamela Cohen, president of
the Union of Councils of
Soviet Jews said that 2,072
Soviet Jews went to Israel,
144 of whom reached the
country on direct flights from
Bucharest, Romania, which
were introduced last year.
Arabs Consider
Forming Party
Tel Aviv (JTA) — Israeli
Arab leaders are debating
whether to establish an in-
dependent Arab political par-
ty or continue to work for
their agenda within the
mainstream factions which,
for most of them, is the Labor
Party.
According to a report Mon-
day in Davar, the head of
several Arab town councils
and public figures from
Galilee, the Negev and the
"triangle," a group of Israeli
Arab towns southeast of
Haifa, held meetings in re-
cent weeks to discuss forming
a new Arab party.
THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS
5