(April 4, 2003) — Hatred, prejudice, racism, discrimination–Students in the sophomore humanities class learned about how all of these acts have affected people throughout history in the United States as well as the rest of the world during their visit to the Museum of Tolerance on March 19 and last Friday. At 8 a.m., students piled into buses and headed off to Los Angeles, anticipating the arrival at the museum. While many had been there in previous years and said they had enjoyed the trip, for others this was a new experience. At the museum, students were divided into groups of 20 to 25 and began the tour. The museum focused on two major themes: the history of prejudice in America, and the injustice to Jews during the Holocaust. The tour started out with a movie on the major genocides of the world. This was a new addition to the museum as many people, Armenians in particular, wanted to see the Armenian genocide in the Museum of Tolerance. According to museum tour guide Estelle Brunetti this movie section was added in response to the demand of the people. “As the museum develops and grows, we are able to put more into it. We are continuously updating as we have only been around for seven or eight years,” commented Brunetti. Students were then taken to a room that showed hatred throughout this country and used interactive computers to view different hate sites on the web. They also visited a diner and saw a movie clip on hatred. Students asked questions and voted on racial issues. Their votes as a class were displayed in bar graphs. Students learned more about hate in America and then moved on to the Holocaust section of the museum. There, students received a card with a picture and information about a particular child and at the end of the tour, they found out whether their child survived or not. The Holocaust section was based primarily on movies and students were taken through a series of dark rooms where they witnessed why the Holocaust began, what happened, and how it ended. Sophomore Patricia Ocampo said, “It opened my eyes to the experiences of the children killed in the Holocaust event.” Sophomore April Nelson added, “It was a better way of learning the information versus a classroom.” The museum trip ended on a happier note. Students went to Farmer’s Market where they were ate lunch with their friends. H umanities teacher Chris Davis said that he hoped the museum trip was a valuable learning experience, as well as a trip in which sophomores could “bond.”