Governor Kate Brown visits the Oregon Jewish Museum and Center for Holocaust Education, OJMCHE, in downtown Portland on July 15 for the ceremonial signing of Senate Bill 664. The bill will require school districts across Oregon to provide instruction about the Holocaust and genocide in social studies classes, starting in the 2020-21 school year. The passing of the bill would make Oregon the 11th state to mandate Holocaust and genocide education. In part the bill’s goal is to “enable students to evaluate the morality of the Holocaust, genocide and similar acts of mass violence and to reflect on the causes of related historical events.”
The bill was unanimously passed in a final vote by Oregon House legislators May 28, and signed by Governor Brown on June 4. The ceremonial signing will bring together supporters of the bill, including Holocaust survivors, Jewish community leaders, and Lake Oswego’s Senator Rob Wagner, who supported the bill, and Lakeridge freshman Claire Sarnowski who reached out to Senator Wagner to work on the passage of the bill.
Brief remarks at the event will include: Judy Margles, Director at OJMCHE, Senator Rob Wagner, Claire Sarnowski, Eva Aigner, member of OJMCHE’s Survivors Speakers Bureau, and Governor Kate Brown.
About Oregon Jewish Museum and Center for Holocaust Education
The Oregon Jewish Museum and Center for Holocaust Education (OJMCHE) explores the legacy of the Jewish experience in Oregon, teaches the universal lessons of the Holocaust, and provides opportunities for intercultural conversation. OJMCHE challenges our visitors to resist indifference and discrimination and to envision a just and inclusive world.
As a cultural organization serving all of Oregon and southwest Washington, OJMCHE provides a community-wide gathering place for exhibitions, public events, educational programs, and performances, and offers a wide range of collaborative opportunities. OJMCHE welcomes people of all income levels, ages, religions and ethnicities. At OJMCHE we seek to teach visitors how to recognize the roots of hatred, how to instill values of inclusion and respect, and how to participate in an inclusive, vibrant democracy built on understanding one another and reconciling differences. Our values shape all of our exhibitions and programs, which celebrate and explore – in the broadest terms – issues of identity, the forces of prejudice, and Jewish contributions to world culture and ideas. For more information, visit www.ojmche.org.
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