A Mercer University alumnus and Holocaust history teacher was one of 43 U.S. high school educators selected for this year’s Auschwitz Legacy Fellowship, which included an intensive, week-long study in Poland.
The fellows took guided tours through Auschwitz I and Auschwitz II-Birkenau, two of the three Auschwitz concentration camps. More than 1 million people — the vast majority of whom were Jewish — were killed at Auschwitz.
“We walked to the place where they did selection to tell people to go left or right, whether they lived or died. And we walked from the train car to where the main crematoriums were,” alumnus Jake Lankford said. “When I was walking down that road, and I could see the crematory in the background, all I could think about was my 3-year-old and my 6-year-old walking in front of me. And I started crying. I felt helpless.
“You’re not supposed to put yourself in simulations, but that’s the only thing that came to my mind. That was the most powerful thing for me, realizing the futility of a parent in that moment or the helplessness of a parent in that moment.”
The trip culminated with a three-day seminar at the Auschwitz-Birkenau Memorial and Museum. Additional educational materials and support are provided to teachers throughout the yearlong fellowship, which is the flagship initiative of the Auschwitz-Birkenau Memorial Foundation.
“This fellowship is designed to keep the memory of the Holocaust alive and to help preserve the remaining traces of this horrific genocidal event,” Lankford said. “When you teach the Holocaust, in most school districts you’re the singleton. To have a community of people that not only support you and believe in what you’re doing but that can also provide resources to you that help you in your work is more important than anything.”
Lankford earned a Bachelor of Science in psychology and Bachelor of Arts in political science from Mercer in 2014 and obtained his Master of Arts in Teaching from the University’s College of Education in 2015. He taught in Macon for a few years before moving with his wife — Mercer alumna Sara (Black) Lankford, CLAS ’13, BUS ’15 — to St. Augustine, Florida.
He is now a genocidal and cultural studies teacher at Tocoi Creek High School, where he teaches Holocaust history honors and African American history honors. He also chairs the social studies department. In addition, he developed his county’s curriculum for teaching the Holocaust and provides teachers with professional development on the topic.
Lankford first became interested in the Holocaust in fifth grade when he did a project about it. He wondered what drove people to participate in the persecution and genocide of ultimately 6 million Jews. Then at Mercer, he took a class about genocide taught by Dr. Darlene Flaming, associate professor of religion. It lit a fire in him.
“What got me about Dr. Flaming’s class, first of all, was she spoke about the Holocaust and genocide with a truth that reached students in their core. Couple that with her personal teaching style. She was all about business, but she deeply cared for her students,” he said. “I think that’s what made it click. I had a caring professor who was willing to tell the truth about dehumanization in a way that stuck with me. I still have the textbook she got us to use, and I used it to build my first Holocaust course.”
Lankford said Mercer taught him to be a continual learner, tap into his own humanity and challenge injustice.
“I came in as a guy from a rural Southern town in Georgia, and I came out an inclusive global citizen,” he said.
