Alan Gratz is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of seventeen novels for young readers, including Ground Zero, Refugee, Allies, Grenade, Prisoner B-3087, Projekt 1065, and Ban This Book. Through his well-researched books, Alan strives to help young readers build empathy and understand how other kids live—their hopes, their struggles, and their motives—so that readerscan view the characters as human beings and not as statistics.

In this online session, participants will hear Alan talk about his book Refugee. Refugee is the story of three young people from different eras and different parts of the world who are connected by their desperate, perilous attempts to flee dangerous situations in their homelands and their dreams of a better, safer tomorrow. He will talk about his inspiration, the historical context of each story, and the connections he discovered between all three. After our Q&A with Alan, participants will be divided into breakout rooms to discuss how the book and this new learning can be applied to their classrooms.

We’ll send you a Zoom link for this session about 24 hours prior to the program. In the meantime, please feel free to email education@ojmche.org with any questions or comments.

This program is in partnership with the Holocaust Center for Humanity, Oregon Jewish Museum and Center for Holocaust Education, and the Rowan Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies.