English department co-chair Meghan McNeeley teaches in Room 321 on March 24. Sophomore Alice Adams registered for the Holocaust and Genocide Studies social studies elective offered for the 2022-2023 school year, which will be taught by McNeeley. “I’m really excited to learn about more of the specifics of the Holocaust, because I feel like none of the history classes have gone to in depth,” Adams said. “I also want to know about the survivors and story after the Holocaust.” Photo by Audrey St.Onge
In the 2022-2023 school year, English department co-chair Meghan McNeeley’s Contemporary Literature elective will be switched to a Holocaust and Genocide Studies elective.
Holocaust and Genocide Studies, a new social studies elective taught by English department co-chair Meghan McNeeley, will be offered in the 2022-2023 school year.
McNeeley applied to teach a Holocaust-focused class three years ago, but the Georgia Department of Education declined it. Instead, McNeeley started a Multicultural Literature class, focused on similar topics but with literature class criteria.
“(In Multicultural Literature,) we talked about how cultures and particular regions were affected (by genocide) and how it changed,” McNeeley said. “Then we carried it over into the effect and impact in the United States. So I had to have those other cultures (to base the class off of) and we did more literature reading.”
After hearing the GaDOE accept the proposal for a 2021 Holocaust class as social studies elective at another school, McNeeley successfully re-pitched the idea at CCHS. Because of the change in class type, McNeeley feels that the non-fiction reading will be better suited than fiction to the class topic.
“(I look forward to) the fact that I don’t have to try to twist (the class) into a literature (class),” McNeeley said. “I have a little bit of a difficult relationship with historical fiction when it comes to the Holocaust because the true stories are poignant, riveting, traumatic, difficult, engaging enough.”
“(I look forward to) the fact that I don’t have to try to twist (the class) into a literature (class).”
— Meghan McNeeley,
English department co-chair
According to sophomore Alice Adams, social studies classes allow for a nonfiction-based curriculum, so discussing the history of the Holocaust and other genocides will be easier.
“I find it more interesting just learning about the facts and not trying to spin it or anything, especially because I feel like it’s often spun to have a positive note and it’s not really a positive thing. So I’d rather just learn about (the Holocaust) straight without any sort of spin,” Adams said.
