Sixteen students at Coquitlam's Dr. Charles Best secondary and two teachers will see their history classroom come alive next month when they visit famous Canadian battlefields.
And, for some, the spring break trip will have personal meaning as they pay respects to their ancestors' service during the first and second world wars in Europe and elsewhere.
Organized by social studies teacher Megan Leslie, who last year accompanied Best students to the Auschwitz-Birkenau Memorial Museum in Poland, the 2012 tour will include visits to Paris, Normandy, Juno Beach, Dieppe and Vimy Ridge, a site that will mark its 95th anniversary in April. Many of the students have never been to Europe and some plan to take journals and cameras to document the experience.
English and physical education teacher Paul Roberts said he's especially looking forward to the stop at Juno Beach, where his grandfather faced the Germans during the Allied invasion on June 6, 1944. There, the students will be guided on a humanitarian effort to clean the beach of litter. "It's one place I've always wanted to go, to see where my grandfather fought," Roberts said, adding, "This is a great opportunity, especially for our Grade 11 and 12 students, to have context about what they're studying in school and what these soldiers went through."
Ian Hanemayer, 17, a Grade 12 student, said the adventure will also hit home for him. Not only was his grandfather captured by the Nazis when he was 14 and living in the Netherlands (he later escaped with a friend) but Hanemayer is also planning to attend the Royal Military College of Canada after graduation as his classmate Skyler Doornberg, an air cadet with 754 Phoenix squadron in Port Moody.
Doornberg, 17, Grade 12, who plans to train as a civil engineer, said he wants to understand better what his grandparents went through. The couple was living in Indonesia - formerly the Dutch East Indies - and met in an internment camp during the Second World War there. "Obviously, it really affected my family. There are many stories," he said, adding, "I want to go to Europe and see the tombstones and read the names. It's just huge what the Canadians did."
But, most of all, the self-funded trip "is a way to see the world," said Aly Sibley, 17, a Grade 12 student. "I want to expand my outlook and see for myself what sacrifices Canadians made overseas."
