A Prince George teacher has won a unique award for opening young minds to the evils of genocide.
Gerry Chidiac teaches his Cultures In Conflict course at Duchess Park secondary school with the gusto of someone who believes the threat of future genocides is only as distant as society wants them to be.
For his efforts, Chidiac was named the co-winner of the Kron Sigal Award For Excellence in Holocaust Education presented by the Vancouver Holocaust Education Centre. The other co-winner, Jewish holocaust survivor Mariette Doduck, has been a guest speaker in Chidiac's class.
It isn't surprising that part of Chidiac's passion for teaching about genocide is a family connection to mass persecution.
"My great uncle was put in a concentration camp," due to an early-20th-century terror campaign against Christians in his ancestral homeland of Syria, Chidiac said.
Combined with his German family links, Chidiac became curious about why large groups of people become empowered to carry out mass murder.
"I asked [German relatives and others who lived through the Second World War] 'how could this happen? It's bad enough to have a group of people think these plans up, but how could they be allowed to carry it out and get away with so much?' And the answer I got was, everyone kept their questions to themselves. People conformed. People believed what they were told or didn't engage in questioning. That is why courses like this are so important. It teaches young people what has actually happened, several times, in different parts of the world, quite recently, and it teaches them to ask questions and speak up and resist conformity."
The award was handed out at a ceremony in Vancouver where Chidiac was given an opportunity to speak about his class and the learning value this award brings with it.
"This award is truly the single greatest honour of my teaching career," he said. "This is the lesson that I focus on with all of my students: how will history judge us? Are we doing all that we can to make a more loving and just society? Or are we conforming to ignorance and injustice as my grandparents did?"
He shared the stage and the event with several people tied closely to the worst of human history. He said rather than anger and bitterness at their lot in life, all were extraordinarily grounded in living a positive life and radiating that to others.
"I really focused on the professional development part of what the event offered," he said. The Vancouver Holocaust Education Centre brought in several survivors and witnesses to the World War Two holocaust - the attempted extermination of the Jewish population by the Nazi regime in Germany - and other experts in the field of genocide. Chidiac said he learned from them during the event and developed contacts that could aid him in teaching his students and other teachers back in Prince George.
It is important, he said, that more and more teachers putting to use the history of these events and the thought processes among leaders and followers that create the conditions needed for so many people to band together to destroy another group of their friends and neighbours.
"Today we in Canada embrace and celebrate our multicultural heritage," Chidiac said. "We are not perfect, but we are improving. Think of how far the world has come in the last 70 years.
