Holodomor Memorial Day 2023

Holodomor Memorial Day in Schools: the 4th Friday of November

On the 29 May of 2008, the Parliament of Canada unanimously passed an “Act to Establish a Ukrainian Famine and Genocide (Holodomor) Memorial Day and to Recognize the Ukrainian Famine 1932-1933 as an Act of Genocide.” As a result of the advocacy of the Holodomor Education Team (UCC-Toronto) and later the National Holodomor Education Committee (NHEC), in 2008, the Toronto District School Board passed a resolution to hold an annual Holodomor Memorial Day in schools on the fourth Friday of November. Since then, other school boards across the country have followed suit. Each year for this event, the National Holodomor Education Committee (NHEC) and increasingly HREC Education, prepare an information pamphlet to help educators commemorate this day in their schools.

Memorial Day Announcement

“I’m starving – let’s get something to eat.”

We hear expressions like this often, but the truth is we are not starving, we’re just hungry. There’s a di°erence. Between 1932 and 1933 millions of Ukrainians were forcibly starved to death by Joseph Stalin’s brutal plan to restructure the Soviet Union – a plan that included destroying the Ukrainian population by removing the food they had grown. Ukrainian farmers were singled out and bullied into turning over their farms to the state, which was called collectivization. Those who refused – were killed on the spot. The Soviet regime also imposed impossible quotas for wheat and forcibly took from families even the smallest of means by which they could survive. The Law of Five Stalks of Grain, passed in 1932, stated that anyone caught taking miniscule amounts of grain from a collective farm could be shot – even children. It is impossible to calculate the misery of the, at least, 4 million people who were starved to death as they watched their mothers, fathers, siblings, and children slowly die around them. To this day, Russia denies that this genocide known as the Holodomor occurred. The persecution of Ukrainians under Russian rulers is nothing new, however. Over the last 350 years, Ukrainians have had their intellectuals imprisoned or killed and their language and cultural practices banned. They have seen those who crave power attempt to erase their identity as a Ukrainian people; and yet, they have survived and thrived.

2022-2023 marks the 90th Commemoration of the Holodomor. In 2022, as Russia attempts to assert its will over their proud and independent nation, Ukrainians are once again facing genocide through Russian destruction of their population. This Holodomor Memorial Day, let us remember the millions who su°ered and died at the hands of Stalin’s cruel Soviet dictatorship. Let us also remember the 42 million courageous Ukrainian citizens now living in Ukraine, and the millions more who form the Ukrainian diaspora throughout the world. Let us stand with them in solidarity in our schools, in our communities, and with our governments. Let us remember that the oppression and destruction of a single democratic nation and its identity – of Ukraine and its people – is a threat to all democracies throughout the world.

Written by Dr. Sue Kenney, educator at Immaculate Heart Academy in New Jersey, and 2020 recipient of the HREC Educator Award for Holodomor Lesson Plan Development

April 16, 2024
Holodomor Remembrance Day In Schools

The Ukrainian Canadian Congress designated April 16 as HOLODOMOR REMEMBRANCE DAY IN SCHOOLS, together with HREC and UCC’s National Holodomor Education Committee (NHEC). Because April 16, 2022 falls on a Saturday, Holodomor Remembrance Day in schools will be held on April 19.

The Holodomor is one of nine global genocides recognized by the Government of Canada and by six of Canada’s provincial legislatures. It was in the Spring of 1933, during the Holodomor’s deadliest year, that the number of deaths escalated significantly.

Every year in April, Ukrainians worldwide traditionally visit cemeteries and remember the dead with special memorial ceremonies held the week after Easter, when victims of the Holodomor are specifically remembered.

Canada has been affected by many genocides and recognizes:
the Armenian Genocide, Ukrainian Holodomor, Jewish Holocaust, the Genocide Against the Tutsi in Rwanda and the Genocide in Bosnia. The Canadian Parliament has also recognized the ongoing genocide being committed against the Yezidi in Syria and Iraq today, the Rohingya
in Myanmar, the Romani during WWII, and currently the Uyghurs in China.

Educators are encouraged to take time in April to remember those who suffered and lost their lives in the Holodomor and other genocides, and to commit to using education to protect and defend human rights and dignity everywhere.