This January it will be 65 years since Auschwitz was liberated from the Nazis. Secondary education is comprehensive in teaching about the Holocaust and schools around the country will mark Holocaust Memorial Day with commemorative activities. Yet there are limited avenues for educators to translate commemoration into practical action against the racism and prejudice today.

Focusing particularly on rural areas where educators have identified racist ideologies, Aegis Students – educational partners to The Holocaust Centre – offer youth-led, cross-curricular workshops that explore the dangers of discrimination, social isolation and persecution.

‘By understanding genocide as prejudice at its most extreme, and by helping young people identity and explore prejudice in their own communities, students are able to recognise genocide not as incomprehensible barbarism, but as a process that originates in prejudice like that they see around them”, says Sophie Leedham, Aegis Students Education and Outreach Coordinator. “By understanding it as prejudice, genocide becomes comprehensible, which is vital as the only way students can feel empowered to take action against genocide is if it makes sense to them.”

Through the workshops, students are given the information, skills and volunteering opportunities to engage with their local communities and with students in Rwanda, the US and Canada, thus helping them to become active global citizens. Activities are centred on raising awareness, campaigning and fundraising to impact positive change.

Following their work with Aegis Students, West Bridgford Comprehensive School in Nottingham successfully fundraised to buy a home for Rwandan genocide survivor Anne-Marie, who was infected by HIV during the genocide.