West Midlands School Children Meet King Charles to Showcase Holocaust Memorial Project
Students invited to Buckingham Palace to recognise innovation and impact of the ‘Echo Eternal’ programme
13th January 2025
10 schoolchildren from across the West Midlands were invited to Buckingham Palace this week to perform music for His Majesty the King.
The children were invited as part of the Echo Eternal programme, which educates children about the Holocaust and pays tribute to survivors through creative responses to their testimonies.
The Echo Eternal programme was created by CORE Education Trust, a multi academy trust which runs four schools in Birmingham. CORE Education Trust was the first recipient of the Pearson Teaching Award for Impact Through Partnerships for the Echo Eternal programme in 2020.
Students visited the Palace on Monday 13th January, performing alongside the National Youth Music Theatre. Students performed three songs for His Majesty, including Wiegala by Ilse Weber, who was killed with her son in the Holocaust, and We Are The Light, which features lyrics written by Birmingham schoolchildren based on the theme of defiance against hatred and prejudice.
The event, held in partnership with the Holocaust Educational Trust and the Holocaust Memorial Day Trust, commemorated the lives and legacies of those affected by the Holocaust.
Commenting on the visit, Adrian Packer, Group CEO of the CORE Education Trust and co-founder of the project, said:
“It is an honour to have Echo Eternal recognised at such an important event.
The Echo Eternal programme has engaged many hundreds of students from diverse communities about the atrocities of the Holocaust and other subsequent genocides.
This once in a lifetime experience highlights the emphasis our schools place on rich personal development opportunities. We are particularly proud that the lyrics of the song we sang to His Majesty were penned by students from Jewellery Quarter Academy.
The message of that song is a powerful one and chimes with a sentiment we hear from all the survivors who inspire us- a wish for a more peaceful world and a better future.
It was a privilege to discuss the project with His Majesty who was keen to talk to our students about the impact the programme has had on them. They were wonderfully articulate and proved again that survivor testimony is in safe hands.”
The performance at Buckingham Palace for His Majesty the King was in tribute to two survivors: Zigi Shipper, the first survivor at the inception of the project from students of Jewellery Quarter Academy in Birmingham; and Zdenka Fantlova.
Zdenka’s testimony is used every year to ensure that all the participating children and young people are reminded about the eternal nature of their promise to be the guardians of the survivors’ testimony. Each participant receives a replica of the tin ring which features in Zdenka’s testimony and remains a poignant symbol of her legacy.
Echo Eternal was conceived by journalist Natasha Kaplinsky OBE and developed in partnership with staff and students from CORE Education Trust schools in Birmingham in 2018. It has been performed across the UK every year since then.
