Module O: Training Seminar for Teachers on the Role of the German Police under the Nazis

Katharina Möller

Target groups
Information disseminators from police academies and people who work at educational institutions

Themes and goals
In this module, participants acquire an overview of those seminars offered by the Neuengamme Concentration Camp Memorial that are designed for employees of the police force. Using selected materials as a starting point, we provide an overview of the themes and methods of these seminars. In this further education course, we also discuss with participants how to best integrate the topic of the role of the police under the Nazis into their own educational work and look at ways to prepare members of the police force before participating in a seminar offered at the Neuengamme Concentration Camp Memorial. For example, we talk about how the seminar can be integrated into the curriculum of the participants’ institution and how the memorial’s educational programme can be coordinated with their own syllabi.

This further education course can be booked for either three or six hours. In the three-hour course, participants acquire an overview of the many different themes before participating in a brief workshop in which they work with selected materials on the topics of a) the participation of police officers in deportations and in the Holocaust and b) the concept of prevention and criminal anthropology. In the six-hour seminar, it is possible to add a second short workshop in which participants work with materials relating to Denazification, Trials of Nazi Criminals and the Continuity of Police Work since 1945 (module K). In addition, we enlarge upon how much room for manoeuver was available to the police in the concentration camp system and the role of the police in deportations. If this further education course is held at the Centre for Historical Studies at the Neuengamme Concentration Camp Memorial, we can also offer a tour of parts of our exhibitions.