by George J Elbaum

This was the seventh consecutive year that I spoke at Charles Wright Academy (CWA) Global Summit, which this year consisted of the 75 students of the CWA freshman class plus 34 high school students and 8 teachers from China, Colombia, England and Poland, the visitors staying with CWA host families during their visit, as usual.  The annual Global Summit is a 10-day program designed to promote peace and social justice by exposing the visiting students to and developing their understanding of the concepts of universal human rights and justice, fair trade and sustainable life styles, and by demonstrating how the choices that each of us makes every day can impact the world. The core of the Summit is a series of speakers whose personal experiences reflect directly on these subjects, and their presentations are followed by group discussions on these very concepts. My presentation was the first time that most of these students heard directly from a Holocaust survivor, and their subsequent questions were very interesting and thought-provoking, some asked of me for the first time in the 100+ talks I have given.

This year’s Global Summit was organized and managed by Ann Vogel, CWA’s International Student Coordinator, whose son had graduated from CWA and her daughter is currently a CWA student.  Ann was assisted by teachers Laryssa Schmidt, Christine Telal and Tom Cramer and students Piper, Sarah, Emma, and Alexys.