The UCL Centre for Holocaust Education have today launched a new series of Research Briefings.

At the Centre, we seek to ensure that teaching and learning about the Holocaust is informed by rigorous scholarship and pioneering empirical research. Drawing on survey responses from 7,952 11-18 year olds from across England and focus group interviews with a further 244, in 2016 the Centre published a landmark study of secondary school aged students’ knowledge and understanding of this history.

This series of research briefings aims to introduce classroom practitioners to key findings from that study and considers their implications for all those engaging with this complex subject in England’s schools and further afield.

Research Briefing 1, Agency and responsibility: Perpetrators and collaborators, reports findings drawn from our national study. When those who were surveyed were asked to provide an open-text reply to the question, ‘Who was responsible for the Holocaust?’ the overwhelming majority of students (79.4%) made reference to Hitler. Half of all students (50.7%) ascribed responsibility to Hitler alone and 20.6% said Hitler was responsible in association with the Nazis.

To read Research Briefing 1, please click here.