Middlesex Is Uneducated About the Holocaust

Kat Stephens
Feb 5
3 min read

Why MX’s lack of Holocaust education in the midst of antisemitism in the United States must be remedied.

In September of 2020, a national poll was conducted to determine what Millennials and Gen-Z knew about the Holocaust. This survey showed that a staggering 63% of respondents did not know that 6 million Jews were murdered in the Holocaust, and half of those people believed the death-toll was under 2 million. This poll is frankly a national embarrassment, but it’s not entirely inconsistent with the level of historical education that seems to be present in this country. At Middlesex, we often pride ourselves on being a school above the fray, on surpassing the standard levels of education. However, in 2026, I am not confident that Middlesex is better educated on the tragedy of the Holocaust than the rest of the country.

In the spring of my sophomore year, my Modern World History carefully dissected major events of the time period. Yet when we reached the topic of World War II, the Holocaust appeared only as a small blip in the reading. As I read Strayer and Nelson’s Ways of the World, I was surprised that amidst the pages that detailed the harrowing events of the Second World War, the authors devoted only a single paragraph to the Holocaust. The minimal treatment appeared only in the assigned homework reading; in class, the topic was not mentioned at all.

A shooting at Bondi Beach, swastika’s spray painted on campuses, Orthodox Jews being attacked in Brooklyn; over the last 2 years, I have never felt the presence of antisemitism stronger in my life. I and my other Jewish peers don’t feel safe wearing a Star of David chain. In fact, this summer at my Columbia course, I didn’t feel comfortable telling anyone that I was Jewish. Not only is antisemitism an issue that affects Jews in the wider world, it affects Jews here at Middlesex. In my opinion, the schools utter lack of Holocaust education is a direct cause of this reality.

The Holocaust is undeniably one of, if not the most defining event of the 20th century. And yet at a school which prides itself on excellence in the humanities, our curriculum has not made sufficient time and space to educate students about a genocide as monumental as the Holocaust. While I think that the Strayer and Nelson textbook is flawed, I don’t disagree that it for the most part does a good job at explaining and analyzing world history. I don’t think that we should throw out the whole textbook because it fails to emphasize the importance of the Holocaust. I am saying that when the textbook fails in providing adequate information on this particular subject, the school should assume responsibility to make up for it.

I asked my junior peers how much time did they feel their teachers spent talking about the Holocaust in class. Some said they spent maybe a class or two discussing it, and others said they don’t think their class talked about it at all. This is a huge problem. With an antisemetic incident occurring on campus just this year, it is more pivotal than ever to educate students on antisemitism.

In 8th grade, my school spent quite a bit of time discussing World War II and the Holocaust. We read a book that recounted a survivor's time in the Blechhammer concentration camp in Poland, describing in vivid detail the horrors of life there. Reading this book was uncomfortable of course, yet it was necessary because it forced my middle school peers and me to think about the Holocaust’s massive impact on the Jewish population and community.

When you learn about something, when you have a deep understanding of it—whether it’s slavery, imperialism, genocides, or other tragic historical events—you learn exactly why it was wrong. Even more importantly, you learn why it can never be repeated. In this divided political climate, antisemitism is more rampant than it has ever been since the Holocaust. As I scroll on social media and encounter a never ending stream of antisemetic videos, comments and posts, I cannot help but compare this uptick in antisemitism to the kind that existed just a little less than 100 years ago.

The truth is, antisemitism, just like any other prejudice, is a product of misinformation and ignorance. If Middlesex wants to combat antisemetic behavior on campus and in the wider world, they need to make sure they are educating their students and graduating people who know what antisemitism looks like, knows where it comes from, and knows why it’s wrong. I, as a Jewish student, implore not just the history department, but other humanities departments as well to think about their curriculums and take a hard look at what is missing.