50 Students Will Take Part in the Fellowships at Auschwitz for the Study of Professional Ethics
New York, NY—This summer, a distinguished group of 50 law, medical, journalism, and seminary school students will  participate in Fellowships at Auschwitz for the Study of Professional Ethics (FASPE), a groundbreaking two week program in New York, Berlin and Poland, focusing on contemporary ethical issues facing their professions using the Holocaust and the conduct of their professions in Nazi Germany as a framework for study.

FASPE law and journalism participants will begin orientation at the Museum of Jewish Heritage-A Living Memorial to the Holocaust on May 25. Medical and seminary students will begin on June 26. Orientation will include visiting the Museum’s exhibits, meeting with Holocaust survivors, and working with FASPE staff and guest scholars to study background about the Holocaust. The first leg of the European portion is in Berlin, where the Fellows focus on exactly what their profession did during the Holocaust. In Poland, the Fellows then travel to Oświęcim, the town the Germans called Auschwitz, where they will tour Auschwitz-Birkenau, and discuss contemporary ethics in their chosen profession.

Topics for the FASPE programs for medical students include Nazi Doctors; Racial Hygiene, Murder, and Genocide; and Eugenics and the Euthanasia Program of the Nazis. The law students’ discussions will include: Breaching Government Secrecy and Obedience to Authority. Topics for the journalism program include: Ethical Challenges of Reporting on Human Rights Abuses; The Relationship Between State Authority and Journalism; and Media’s Role in Creating and Remembering Historical Narrative. The seminary students will discuss Christian Churches and Military Chaplains in Nazi Germany, Post War Reconciliation, Apologies, and Confessions; and Dealing with Religious Extremism. The program’s medical and law programs will be facilitated by faculty from Yale University, including Dr. Mark Mercurio, Dr. John S. Hughes, Professor Robert Burt, and Yale alumni Amos Friedland.  The journalism program will be led by Columbia University professors Ari Goldman and Andie Tucher. The seminary program will be led by John Langan, SJ and Professor LeRoy Walters of Georgetown University. FASPE is under the auspices of the Museum of Jewish Heritage  – A Living Memorial to the Holocaust.

FASPE’s goal is to provide tomorrow’s leaders with opportunities to increase their awareness and preparedness for the ethical issues that they will confront in their professional careers. FASPE Founder C. David Goldman says that “FASPE raises the question of what roles the professionals played in the Holocaust and what can be derived from history that can inform...