Mobile Museum of Tolerance visits Springfield Jewish Community Center

Springfield Mayor Domenic Sarno joins middle school students, their chaperones and educators stand in front of a Mobile Museum of Tolerance that visited the Springfield Jewish Community Center.
Reminder Publishing photo by Sarah Heinonen

LONGMEADOW — Brian Strafach looked around the small, rectangular space where more than a dozen middle schoolers sat with the handful of adults who accompanied them.

A black-and-white photo of a narrow building was displayed on a large screen that spanned the entirety of one wall.

An arrow pointed to a window at the top of the building in the Netherlands where Otto Frank, his wife Edith Frank, their daughters, Margot and Anne, and four other people hid in an attic for two years during World War II.

“What would you take with you if you had to live there?” Strafach asked the students. One-by-one, they raised their hands and suggested food, books, blankets and games.

The lesson on Anne Frank, her family and their fate during the Holocaust was not taught in a classroom or traditional history museum. Instead, the students were learning inside a large blue bus parked outside the Springfield Jewish Community Center in Longmeadow. The lesson is just one of several that take place in Mobile Museums of Tolerance.

Partway through the lesson, Springfield Mayor Domenic Sarno arrived and spoke to the children about the importance of learning about the Holocaust. He shared stories about seeing serial numbers tattooed on the arms of concentration camp survivors. While some people deny that the Holocaust happened, he said, “We always have to remember our past and our history, so it isn’t repeating.”

Sarno said, “The Jewish people are a proud people,” and he thanked the JCC for hosting the Mobile Museums of Tolerance.

The first Mobile Museum of Tolerance began operating in Chicago, Illinois, in 2021. Now, there are nine mobile museums in California, Florida, New York and Massachusetts. The traveling classrooms offer students in grades 5-12, age-appropriate lessons on the Holocaust, the Civil Rights Movement and combating hate speech through digital literacy.

“One of our goals is to leave students inspired to learn more,” said Strafach, the Mobile Museum of Tolerance lead educator for the Northeast. He said the content is designed to add to what students learn in schools. Strafach said the mobile museums, which often visit schools, community centers and houses of worship, can be requested to visit anywhere, provided there are six parking spaces available for the bus to park. The programming is free of charge, and in Massachusetts, it is funded through the state Department of Elementary and Secondary Education.

The programs are historical resources, and while they do not teach about current events, they help students “reflect on how they treat each other,” Strafach said. “We want students to walk away understanding that we have models from the past that show how to treat people today.”

To learn more about the Mobile Museums of Tolerance, or to request a visit, go to mmot.com.