Grade 8 Westmount Public School student Ivan Almemou thought he knew about the Holocaust.
He’d read books on the subject and learned how six million Jews perished at the hands of the Nazis in the Second World War.
But it wasn’t until he heard Elly Gotz, now 96, tell his story last week to London students that Almemou came to truly understand the horror of what happened, and give some thought to how it might be prevented from happening again.
“It was jaw-dropping,” said Almemou about Gotz’s one-hour talk, delivered to some 3,000 Thames Valley District School board students via video conference. “You don’t really have words for it.”
Gotz was plucked from a Jewish ghetto in Lithuania and thrust into …