Suppose we want to explore our ancestors’ history- where and how our grandparents or great-grandparents lived. Sometimes we find that they prefer not to discuss these topics. We find people who have developed a powerful rejection of their country of origin or are distressed by telling their stories. Sometimes the people who could teach us about our roots are no longer around to talk to. Thus, in some cases, the objects that our ancestors brought with them from the different places where they lived can help to tell us their story. Only when I began the procedure to obtain Polish citizenship and a Polish passport did I learn more about the story of my zeide, my father's father. To trace the information they requested, I found myself reading and rereading the Polish passport that he had brought with him when he came to Argentina from Choroszcz in 1930, by boat, at the age of 14. I didn't get to know him. I know he didn’t talk about his life in Poland and that he had contempt for everything related to the country and his past there. This is understandable: his life there had been difficult, and years later, it was in Poland that one of the most terrible massacres of humanity would take place.
As an educator, I was in charge of planning the educational space with the theme of Yom Hashoah. It was a challenge to be creative with the stories, the music, the images, the activities, and the words. Year after year, I felt the need to find a new way of transmitting the value of memory and continuity. There are so many resources, and I tried to find the best way for my students to appreciate, in accordance with their age, what happened, through the value that I sought to transmit.
Dan Lande is an Argentinian who specializes in creativity and innovation. In the world of social networks, he is well known for sharing his trips throughout the world in a very entertaining and particular way (@rulodeviaje). His passion for learning about places and sharing them led him to shift his focus to developing travel-related projects.
One day, by accident, he broke five plates that had belonged to his grandmother; they had been in his family for more than 70 years. At that moment, and throughout that night, he felt guilt; he felt he had dishonored his ancestors. The incident prompted him to take a trip to the towns where his grandparents had lived, taking pieces of broken plate to leave in commemoration of them, along with a written message, as a tribute. As with my zeide, Dan's grandparents did not share much about their origins, so he decided to investigate a little more about them in each town.
Then he thought about sharing his experience and offering something similar to others who wished to honor their relatives in this way. He discovered that, in many cases, the information that people have about their grandparents and great-grandparents is scant and fragmented, and he broadened his project to include the investigation and reconstruction of the personal histories of those who emigrated from Eastern Europe and Russia in the early 20th century. He called his project La Ruta de las Bobes – the Route of the Bobbes (grandmothers). One of its objectives is to perpetuate the memory of the Holocaust, educating and raising awareness among the younger generation of a history with few survivors. Although Dan's focus at the time was travel and sharing experiences, the project today is centered mainly around personal stories.
We usually associate the concept of innovation with something completely new: technology, modernity, and the future. Renewal, on the other hand, is a novelty based on a change in something that already exists. The Ruta de las Bobes is a creative and innovative project that connects our roots with our history, managing to tell it differently. It finds a unique and different way to look at the past and to remember in the present.
One of the most significant tracks offered by the Melton Master's degree takes an innovative look at the various challenges that educators face. As Jonathan Mirvis explains in the interview we conducted with him, the aim of the track is to accompany students in the quest to find a way to carry out their projects and innovative ideas.