November 4, 2010: Milton District High School will host its first Holocaust to Hope Conference from November 8-13, 2010.

It will bring together leaders, scholars and survivors at the school  (396 Williams Avenue) to examine the events and effects of the World War II Holocaust, genocides and civil wars in Armenia, Rawanda, Darfur and Sierra Leone, as well as discussing the impact of Internet hate crimes.

The conference, organized by staff and students, features exhibitions from Yad Vashem, The Anne Frank Museum and the Centre of Tolerance in New York. As well, local and world-renowned guest speakers working in fields leading toward social justice, peace and tolerance will be present.

Notable speakers include Ephraim Kaye, director of International Seminars for Educators at Yad Vashem, Jerusalem, Israel; Holocaust survivors, Max Eisen and Dr. Nadia Rosa; and Rwandan genocide survivor, Leo Kabalista.

Community members are welcome to attend the free conference.

Milton District High School Principal Ian Jones says the Martin Luther King Jr. quote – “Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter” – embodies the initiative the school has taken with its conference.

“By providing learning opportunities to students that focus on diversity and acceptance, we have made a priority in our school to demonstrate that we will not ‘become silent about things that matter,’” Jones says.

Leading up to the conference, students at MDHS have been collecting pennies and placing them in a penny wall, through an initiative called, The Penny Project. The goal is to collect six million pennies as a tribute to those who lost their lives in the Holocaust. After the conference, all of the pennies will be donated to War Child, a non-profit organization that helps to raise awareness and support of war-affected children around the world.



For additional information, contact:
      Ian Jones, Principal, Milton District High School
      Halton District School Board
      905-878-2839