Jerquila Slaughter’s students were inspired to make a real difference in their community after watching testimony in IWitness.

After learning about IWitness at the Dallas Holocaust Museum Center for Education and Tolerance’s summer workshop for teachers, Slaughter began assigning IWitness activities to her students at Gilliam Collegiate Academy this semester.

She used IWitness in her elective course that covers topics such as genocide and gentrification this semester and plans to also use IWitness in her Advanced Research course this spring.

Slaughter assigned IWitness activities and research questions about specific topics that students must complete on deadline. For the students who are passionate about this subject, IWitness has been a great discussion starter, Slaughter said.

But the activity that had the biggest impact on them was the IWitness Video Challenge, which got students thinking about how they could give back to their community.

“The scholars here at Gilliam Collegiate Academy have shown tremendous compassion and empathy for what many of the survivors have gone through as it reflected in their service projects that they chose,” she said.

Students collected canned goods, cleaned an elderly gentleman’s home and collected blankets and socks for the homeless.

“Seeing the outcome of their hard work was emotional for me, because they felt so good to get out in the community to help others,” Slaughter said. “A group of seniors went out to feed the homeless twice.  They coordinated everything and utilized their own resources because they saw the need to do more.”

Slaughter said the engaging, educational and emotional nature of IWitness initially drew her in to IWitness at the Dallas Holocaust Museum, and they have impacted her students in the same way. It has opened their eyes to the fact that genocide really can happen anywhere.

“I believe the survivor testimony impact students greatly,” she said. “It helps them to connect to a person whose story is their own and they get to hear the perspective from a person who lived through horrendous violence and survived.”