News
2007 Training Session for Auschwitz Museum Guides
The annual training sessions for the more than 200 Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum guides has begun. As in the previous year, the training program has been developed by the International Center for Education about Auschwitz and the Holocaust, which has been in operation for two years.
In line with tradition, Center director Krystyna Oleksy chaired the opening meeting. She thanked the guides for serving record numbers of visitors--a million people traveled to Oświęcim in 2006 to see the site of the former Nazi German concentration camp.
The visitors received expert service from the Museum guides, who worked in English, Croatian, Dutch, French, German, Hebrew, Hungarian, Italian, Japanese, Polish, Russian, Serbian, Slovakian, Spanish, and Swedish.
Oleksy discussed the Museum's ongoing work and plans for the immediate future. She drew special attention to the preservation work on the ruins of crematorium and gas chambers no. II in Birkenau, plans associated with the creation of a new main exhibition, and the projected adaptation of the former camp kitchen for an exhibition of art works created in the camp, during wartime, by prisoners.
Oleksy also presented flowers and thanks to Józef Dąbrowski, who is retiring after making it possible for thousands of Italians to learn about the tragic history of Auschwitz.
Staff members Alicja Białecka, Antoni Stańczyk and Jacek Lech presented information on the Education Center's work.
At the conclusion of the first meeting, the participants viewed the documentary film Escapee, directed by Marek Tomasz Pawłowski, profiling Auschwitz survivor Kazimierz Piechowski. He is the only one left alive of the four prisoners who made a spectacular escape in June 1942 when, disguised in SS uniforms, they drove away from the heavily guarded camp terrain in a vehicle stolen from the SS motor pool.
During subsequent meetings, participants in the training session will listen to lectures on the denial of the crime of genocide in Auschwitz and the subject of anti-Semitism after Auschwitz, and be given an opportunity to familiarize themselves with the rich holdings of the Museum's Collections Department.
There are also plans to dedicate one evening to a performance by Gail Rosen and Elizabeth Bolton of I Did Not Throw Up My Hands--Hilda Stern Cohen in the Face of Holocaust Hatred, which is based on Stern Cohen's works. The performance is an extraordinary testament to the life of this woman who survived the Łódź ghetto and Auschwitz.
This year's training session will end with a meeting with a friend of the Museum, Halina Birenbaum, an extraordinary woman who faced incredibly cruel experiences. During the war, Halina Birenbaum lost nearly her whole family, who were murdered by the Germans. She survived the Warsaw ghetto as a child before being deported to the camp at Majdanek at the age of 13. She was also in Auschwitz, Ravensbrück, and Neustadt-Glewe. Halina Birenbaum will share her traumatic experiences with the guides and respond to their questions.
Schedule of Training Sessions for Guides, February 7 - March 15, 2007.
-
Wednesday, Feb. 7
General assembly, summary of work in 2006, analysis of attendance, presentation of training program. The Work of the International Center for Education about Auschwitz and the Holocaust. Showing of the film The Escapee.; -
Thursday, Feb. 15
Franciszek Piper, The Denial of the Crime of Genocide in Auschwitz. Showing of the film Hide and Seek. ; -
Thursday, Feb. 22
The Anatomy of Prejudice. Anti-Semitism after Auschwitz: Theories, Research, the Dynamics of Change (Jolanta Ambrosewicz-Jacobs); -
Tuesday, Feb. 27
I Did Not Throw Up My Hands--Hilda Stern Cohen in the Face of Holocaust Hatred, performed by Gail Rosen and Elizabeth Bolton ; -
Friday, Mar. 2
Methodological training. Report on inspections (Krystyna Oleksy, Andrzej Kacorzyk). Analysis of guidelines (Antoni Stańczyk, Mirosław Obstarczyk). Workshops on guiding visitors; -
Tuesday-Friday, Mar. 6-9 2007
Presentation of the Collections Department (Igor Bartosik, Agnieszka Sieradzka); -
Thursday, Mar. 15
Meting with former prisoner Halina Birenbaum.
