The Holocaust and Moral Education

F""("1he belief that schoo~ hav.e a resp?nsibility t~ teach ~ values is a very old Idea m Amencan education. In recent years, however, the aims and methods of programs in moral education have become a subject of intense debate. Some critics believe that such programs distract schools from their essential academic mission. Religious conservatives, wary of curricula that they perceive as favoring moral relativism, insist that the teaching of values should be left to parents and religious institutions. Their distrust extends to classroom efforts to foster "critical thinking II by inviting students to discuss their personal responses to texts and historical events. One of the most widely adopted and controversial approaches to moral education addresses the specific issues of prejudice, conformity, and individual responsibility. It does this by examining the rise of Nazism and its culmination in the Holocaust. Facing History and Ourselves, an organization created in 1976, has produced a curriculum and resource book and conducts workshops for teachers. Its materials are now offered, in some form, to 500,000 students mostly eighth and ninth graders each year. The program received an unexpected burst of attention last fall, when a political scientist who had criticized it for not presenting the "Nazi point of view" was named historian of the House of Representatives. Once her comments attracted public notice, Christina Jeffrey was abruptly dismissed. But her remarks provoked a spate of articles and letters in national publications concerning the teaching of the Holocaust. Most commentators spent little time refuting the charge that Facing History had fail.ed to aChi.eve "balance or objectivity" in its exploration of NaZIsm. Other, more significant questions about the program its assumptions and moral purposes engaged them instead. Was the Holocaust a "unique" event in human history? Is it legitimate to compare the Holoca~st to other historical crimes, such as those perpetrated m the Soviet Union in the 1930s, Cambodia in the 1970s, Rwanda and Bosnia in the 1990s? Should the Holocaust be used as a reference point for teaching children about racism and social injustice in general about scapegoating, intolerance, and prejudice that can occur in any society?