Dr. Leo Pavlát
Director of the Jewish Museum in Prague

The project "Homage to the Child Victims of the Holocaust" is part of a broader project entitled "Neighbours Who Disappeared", which is the result of the long-term efforts of the Jewish Museum in Prague's Education and Culture Centre to mediate the incommunicable experience of the Shoah through the individual stories of young people. The Jewish Museum in Prague's Education and Culture Centre has been making the "Neighbours Who Disappeared" project available to Czech schools since 1999. Implementation of this project has been helped by the civic association Zapomenutí/ The Forgotten Ones under a cooperation agreement since 2002.
At the outset of the project, the Jewish Museum in Prague provided the initial inspiration and handed out questionnaires to help search for murdered fellow citizens who once lived in the neighbourhoods of the young people taking part in today's project. Pupils and students, with the support of their teachers, transformed this inspiration into action and, in so doing, materialized what had seemed to be irretrievably forgotten. They wrote dozens of letters, read many books and chronicles, visited the archives, sought out and spoke with Shoah witnesses, gathered and sorted photographs and documents. On the basis of the above, they wrote up their testimonies - accounts of Bohemian and Moravian Jews and of the places where they lived before being exposed to murderous hatred.
The results of the project show that, on the basis of people's individual stories - formed by different family and cultural traditions in a specific historical period - the young people of today can learn much not only about history - both local and general - but also about social behaviour in a totalitarian regime, about the behaviour of individuals faced with immediate danger, and also - about themselves.
On the basis of the above, the Jewish Museum in Prague's Education and Culture Centre put together motivational materials to which pupils and students have largely contributed - notably, four versions of a travelling exhibition and catalogues, methodological and presentational publications on the project and Power Point presentations). The project has also inspired the emergence of a film project by Sunfilm - Spiral Productions s.r.o. entitled "Neighbours Who Disappeared or A Search by Children with Cameras On the Trail of Jewish Fellow Citizens" (so far, two episodes have been made for the project in Litomyšl and Hartmanice).
Since 2003, the "Neighbours Who Disappeared" project has taken on another form with the establishment of regional displays of children's project work, brochures, collections of papers and school websites. This is establishing the basic idea behind the second phase of the project, which is entitled "Homage to the Child Victims of the Holocaust". Its aim is to produce a memorial plaque for schools in memory of the children - former classmates - who disappeared from schools in 1940-41 on account of their Jewish descent.
The continuation of the project "Neighbours Who Disappeared" with the "Homage to the Child Victims of the Holocaust" also involves a number of other possibilities. It may constitute one of the sources for re-establishing the identity of schools. Further, it enables the development of a cross-sectional theme in the school curriculum (in accordance with the Framework Educational Program of the Czech Ministry of Education, Youth and Sport) and, at the same time, provides a new context for reflections on local history, emphasizes the role of the school as a cultural centre in the community, gives inspiration for closer cooperation with local authorities and local cultural institutions. In addition, the project "Homage to the Child Victims of the Holocaust" may lead to the presentation of school project work on a national and international level.
The Jewish Museum in Prague considers the "Neighbours Who Disappeared" and "Homage to the Child Victims of the Holocaust" projects to be of great importance. Together, they constitute prevention and act as counterweight to the rise of violent manifestations in society. Personally, I also appreciate the overall project as a tool against forgetting the tragic events of the Second World War. It connects Shoah survivors with today's young generation, bridges the generational gap and enables the sharing of an experience that is difficult to communicate. Furthermore, the project brings together various organizations and institutions (civic groups, cultural organizations, Christian and Jewish institutions, state and local authorities, universities and schools) in the struggle against latent and manifest racism and anti-Semitism.
The civic association Zapomenutí/ The Forgotten Ones has a very important role to the play in the development of this project. In concurrence with the Jewish Museum in Prague, it provides, among other things, inspiration and financial support for the establishment and dissemination of the project's trial results - exhibitions, catalogues and collections of papers, which in themselves provide the best motivation for the further arduous work of pupils and students.

On behalf of the Jewish Museum in Prague, I am calling for support of the activities of this association in its development of the next phase of the "Neighbours Who Disappeared" project, entitled "Homage to the Child Victims of the Holocaust".