Bill would mandate Holocaust education in Maryland schools

Feb. 28—Three Frederick County lawmakers have signed on to a bill that would mandate Holocaust education in schools across Maryland.

State Sen. Ben Kramer, D-Montgomery, is the lead sponsor of Senate Bill 837, called the Educate to Stop the Hate Act.

Democratic Sen. Karen Lewis Young, D-Frederick, as well as Republican Sens. Paul Corderman and Justin Ready, whose districts include parts of Frederick County, are among the bill's seven co-sponsors.

The bill would require the Maryland State Department of Education (MSDE) to "develop guidelines for instructional content on the Holocaust that is age-appropriate and interdisciplinary," and "revise and enhance required Holocaust instruction in public elementary school, middle school and high school curricula."

It would also require local school systems to dedicate some federal teacher development funding toward professional learning on the genocide.

Twenty-three states have laws requiring Holocaust education.

In a hearing before the Senate's Education, Energy and the Environment Committee last week, Kramer said Maryland should join them. He pointed to recent surveys that highlighted Americans' shrinking knowledge of the Holocaust, including a 2020 report from an advocacy group that studied young people's familiarity.

Fifty-five percent of Maryland respondents to the survey, conducted by the Claims Conference, could not name a single concentration camp or ghetto. Sixty-four percent of them did not know 6 million Jews were killed in the Holocaust, and 13% said they believed Jews caused the Holocaust.

The study ranked Maryland in the bottom 10 states for Holocaust knowledge.

"It was once believed that the sheer magnitude of this mind-numbing event and the cries of 'never forget' would keep the lessons of the Holocaust seared into our memories," Kramer said at last week's hearing in Annapolis. "Yet, here we are."

MSDE develops curriculum standards and frameworks for each subject and grade level. Its current frameworks only reference the Holocaust at the high school level.

In Frederick County Public Schools and across the state, high schoolers are required to take American history and modern world history courses, which include lessons on the Holocaust.

Middle schoolers learn about Judaism and other world religions, but don't address the Holocaust.

SB837 would mandate Holocaust instruction beginning in fifth grade social studies. Sixth and seventh graders would need to study "the roots of antisemitism that led to the Holocaust."

The existing requirements for Holocaust instruction in high school would be bolstered by the bill, too.

Kramer introduced a similar bill in 2019, but it died in committee. In response to concerns from lawmakers and advocates, later that year, then-State Superintendent Karen Salmon announced plans to enhance Holocaust education across the state.

But at last week's hearing for the 2023 bill, Sarah Mersky Miicke, deputy director of the Baltimore Jewish Council, said MSDE had failed to "fully and adequately implement" the changes it committed to.

Committee members watched a viral 2014 video of college students in Pennsylvania — who had attended the state's public schools — failing to answer basic questions about the Holocaust. The students in the video could not describe what it was, where it happened or when it began.

Later that year, Pennsylvania became the sixth state to pass a law mandating Holocaust education in its schools.

People who spoke in favor of SB837 pointed to the increasing prevalence of antisemitic incidents, including a recent spate of them in Montgomery County.

Follow Jillian Atelsek on Twitter: @jillian_atelsek