Facing History and Ourselves: Introduction

Introduction

            My name is Riley Taylor, and I am a senior at Westborough High School in Westborough, Massachusetts. I was born in Canada, and lived there for the first part of my life. My favorite course I ever took at WHS was AP Biology. I am looking to go to University for either biology or business.

            Facing History and Ourselves is a course that is exactly what its name entails. Throughout this course, we were forced to look at the bleakest aspects of modern history: segregation in the United States, WWI & II, and the Holocaust. The mainstay in the course was the Holocaust. We looked at the World Wars and at the Jim Crow era to gain an understanding of how ignorance and hatred could lead to negative things happening in the United States and the World. Essentially, that portion of the course was devoted towards helping us understand that type of thinking. The other part of the course, focusing on the Holocaust, was so important because the Holocaust was the most traumatic example of human hatred and ignorance. We learned every aspect about the Holocaust: from the hatred imparted on the Jews, to the construction of ghettos, to the Final Solution.

We did all this for one simple reason: to change ourselves. Through better understanding how the Holocaust happened and what actions lead to an event like this, we could then better examine ourselves and vow to never take those actions. In short, this course was both retrospective and prospective. It was retrospective because we looked back in history for understanding; it was prospective because we looked forward and to ourselves to change our actions in the future for the better.

I chose this course in the first place because was I interested enough in social studies to wish to continue with the subject into my senior year. I had heard about this course from people before me and I consistently heard that it was eye-opening, as well as that it wasn’t a lot of work. And although I haven’t had that much homework in the class, I find that I have had to do the work reflecting about myself. This was another factor in my choosing to take the course – I had heard that you had to do a lot of reflecting about yourself. Finally, the last reason I choose this course was because of my great interest in the Holocaust. I remember reading Milkweed by Jerry Spinelli when I was in 5^th Grade, and being interested ever since. And now, well, I’m here.