Manitoba implements compulsory holocaust teaching following the advocacy of B’Nai British Canada

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May 5, 2025

Winnipeg – The province of Manitoba is committed to making the Holocaust education compulsory for students of 6^e9^e et 11^e year (the equivalence of 6^e year of primary and 3^e et 5^e Secondary in Quebec), an initiative that B’Nai Brith Canada defended throughout the country.

“B’NAI Brith Canada congratulates the Prime Minister [Wab] Kinew for having kept her electoral promise to improve the teaching of the Holocaust in Manitoba, “said Dr. Ruth Ashrafi, regional director of B’Nai British Canada for Manitoba and Saskatchewan. “We are impatient to continue to collaborate with the province as part of initiatives aimed at combating hatred”.

Manitoba is the sixth Canadian province to announce its intention to make the study of the holocaust compulsory in secondary schools. Teachers will have to attend training sessions on the subject and how to communicate it to students. The new educational program will come into force from September 2025.

The other provinces that have undertaken to teach the holocaust a compulsory element of their school program are Ontario, British Columbia, New Brunswick, Saskatchewan and Alberta. In 2022, the northwest territories began to include the teaching of the holocaust in their program of 6^e year, and they remain the only territory to do so.

B’NAI Brith Canada actively promotes the education and commemoration of the holocaust. In 2020, our organization partially subsidized a documentary on the holocaust produced by students and entitled truth Against distortion (the truth against distortion). Under the leadership of Social Studies Kelly Hiebert, secondary school students from Manitoba interviewed local Holocaust survivors. Mr. Hiebert was then hired by the Manitoba government to develop his official Holocaust program.

On April 24, Mike Moroz, Minister of Innovation and New Manitoba Technologies, recognized the role of B’Nai British Canada in the commemoration of the Holocaust during his speech during Yom Hashoah. He mentioned our UNTO Every Person?

“Anti -Semitism is at a critical point in Canada,” said Richard Robertson, director of research and advocacy at B’Nai Brith Canada. “Our organization has long believed that the teaching of the holocaust to our young people is an important way to fight hatred, to promote Canadian values ​​and to protect the well-being of Jews in this country.”