Museum Council students invited to take part in the Lord Mayor of Oxford’s Holocaust Memorial Ceremony

Yesterday, our year 8 Museum Council students took part in the Town Hall Holocaust Memorial Ceremony, marking the 80th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau, the largest Nazi concentration camp, and the 30th anniversary of the genocide in Bosnia.

The Ceremony at the Town Hall was opened by Councillor Mike Rowley, Lord Mayor of Oxford, and followed with a reflection from Tony Samuel of the Oxford Jewish Congregation before Beth Jones from the Museum of Oxford explained the project she worked on with the ten students from the Rumble Museum Council. 

The ‘80 Candles for 80 Years’ project  from the Holocaust Memorial Day Trust (HMDT) invited communities and schools across the UK to design and create 80 unique candleholders to mark the 80th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau, honouring the Jewish individuals and other communities persecuted by the Nazis. Beth delivered a workshop with students at school in October, where they learnt about holocaust survivor Anita Lasker-Wallfisch, who survived a year in Auschwitz as a member of the camp orchestra, as a cellist, before being sent to Bergen-Belsen as the Russians advanced.
Whilst designing and making their candleholders the Museum Council students listened to the captivating ‘The Armed Man - A Mass For Peace - Benedictus’ composed by Welsh composer Karl Jenkins, which opens with an emotional cello solo, and was released in 2001, dedicated to the victims of the Kosovo crisis. 

‘Benedictus’  was played as students, Jess, Nadia, Elin, Anna and Rosa added their candleholders to the display at the front of the Assembly Room yesterday, one by one with the other speakers at the event, including Anneliese Dodds MP, Monawar Hussain from The Oxford Foundation and Reverend Anthony Buckley, City Rector. It was a very moving service as everyone was silent listening to the emotional ‘Benedictus’ and reflecting on one of the darkest chapters of human history.

After the service, some of the attendees, including former students - one gentleman explaining that when he was at Cheney the boys and girls schools were separated by a wire fence(!) - came over to congratulate the year 8s on their project.

Anneliese Dodds, MP also spoke to the students before they each presented their candles and what they represented to Producer Martin Eastaugh, whilst they were filmed for BBC South News. 

The five students then went to lunch with the Lord Mayor in his chambers before going back to the Assembly Room to be interviewed with Beth about the project and what they had learnt, which aired on BBC Radio Oxford news this morning (from 1:38:34 in).

Well done to everyone involved with this important project, which focuses on a commitment to learn from the past, for a better tomorrow.

See also: Rumble Museum Council students present Holocaust Candles project to the King