Holocaust Education Center

"If you don't know at least part of the story, if you don't know that there is a story, then we shall bequeath upon our descendants a sense of shame. We could not save those who died but we can save them from dying again because to forget is to kill them again. So why should the next generation in the 21st century live with that shame? For the dead and the living, we must bear witness."

 

Elie Wiesel

American Rescue Efforts during the Holocaust

March 8 @ 5:00 pm

With the annexation of Austria and Czechoslovakia in 1938, and due to the restrictive quota, the waiting list for those who wanted to enter the United States from Nazi-occupied Europe grew to span ten years. As the obstacles to leaving became insurmountable, European Jews, and those who strove to help them, responded creatively and sought any and every opportunity for escape. Join United States Holocaust Memorial Museum Curator Susan Goldstein Snyder as she explores the ways Americans, both Jewish and non-Jewish, attempted to help the Jews of Europe who were increasingly living under the Nazi cloud.

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Virtual Tour for Students and Teachers

March 20 @ 1:00 pm

In partnership with Echoes & Reflections, join us for a virtual tour of the groundbreaking exhibition Auschwitz: Not long ago. Not far away. Students and educators will study Jewish life before, during, and after the Holocaust using artifacts and personal stories to examine this period in history.

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"The future historian will have to dedicate an appropriate page to Jewish women in the war. She will take up an important page in history for her courage and her steadfastness. By her merit, thousands of families have managed to surmount the terror of the times." 

Emanuel Ringelblum, (Jewish historian, 1900-1944, notes from inside the Warsaw Ghetto)

Today marks the beginning of the 41st Annual Women's History Month. The Jewish Partisan Educational Foundation website offers an extensive library of easily accessible resources and lesson plans to help you teach students about Jewish women in the partisans. Empower them through the lives of Sara Fortis, Brenda Senders (z''l), Sara Ginaite-Rubinson (z''l) (pictured above), and the many other women who fought back against the Nazis and their collaborators during World War II. 

JPEF's resources offer in-depth insights into the lives of female Jewish partisans who resisted as soldiers, spies, saboteurs, medics, and vital support personnel, helping to save people and end the war.

• Women in the Partisans Resource Page: Includes free curricula, links to profiles with biographies, primary-source video testimonials, and photos, plus a printable poster and other resources
• Short Films: Every Day the Impossible: Jewish Women in the Partisans (15:00) and A Partisan Returns: The Legacy of Two Sisters (21:00) – both narrated by Emmy-winner Tovah Feldshuh
• Free Curriculum: Women in the Partisans Study Guide
• Video Course: A 41-minute training that can be used as lesson prep (offering free CEUs) or shown in class.

For additional information, read JPEF's blog about female Jewish partisans.

Sheri Rosenblum
Director of Development and Outreach

Teaching the Holocaust, Empowering Students

Sign up today for our first 3-Part Online Course of 2021, which includes new interactive learning tools that create a more collaborative environment for educators as they enhance their Holocaust teaching skills and guide students in building a brighter future. New features include:

Live sessions with a facilitator

Tools for remote classroom instruction

Discussion boards to support sharing of teaching methods

Course opens February 1. We hope to see you there!

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The Museum of Jewish Heritage Online Education Program

The Museum of Jewish Heritage — A Living Memorial to the Holocaust is providing online education programs for educators and students during this time of remote learning. Online professional development for educators is offered each Monday from 3:00-4:00 pm CST. Corresponding lesson for students are offered on Tuesdays from 10:00-11:00 am CST. 

SEE ROSTER OF CLASSES AND REGISTRATION INFORMATION

Illinois Holocaust Museum and Education Center

Illinois Holocaust Museum and Education Center in Skokie offers a wide array of resources for edicators and students. 

SEE VIRTUAL EDICATOR RESOURCES

Anti-Defamation League: Teaching the Holocaust

Echoes & Reflections website offers free online webinars and courses for educators.

“Our webinars are designed to increase participants’ knowledge of Holocaust history, explore and access classroom-ready content, and support instructional practice to promote student learning and understanding of this complex history and its lasting effect on the world.”

WEBINARS SCHEDULE

The Current State of Holocaust Education

Holocaust Education Chair Brian Kahn and CUJF Director Linda Bauer are discussing teaching about genocide and the Holocaust on WILL-AM 580's "The 21st" radio show: strategies and challenges of dealing with this important, evolving issue.

LISTEN TO PODCAST

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Holocaust Education Center Scholarships

The Holocaust Education Center of Champaign Urbana Jewish Federation proudly sponsors educators to attend professional development sessions in an effort to inform their current practice teaching the Holocaust and contemporary genocide.

LEARN HOW TO APPLY

Students in University Laboratory High School’s German 4 class were privileged to welcome Holocaust survivor Dr. William Gingold as a guest speaker in their class. Gingold, whose family fled the Warsaw Ghetto, shared his story publicly for the first time with Uni students and faculty. 

The presentation was part of teacher Jenny Robins’ unit on WWII and the Holocaust, where she brings in community members to help students better understand this difficult period in German history.

Gingold shared the story of his family’s escape, their time in a camp in Russia, his experience in a DP camp, and, finally, his family’s journey to the U.S. where they settled in Milwaukee. 

His story was illustrated by a series of photos, as well as by passing around “Tunnel, Smuggle, Collect: A Holocaust Boy”, a book about Gingold’s older brother, Sam. The book was researched and written by Gingold's nephew, Jeffrey Gingold.

Gingold’s vivid and touching account inspired both tears and hope, and the Uni community is honored to have been the first to publicly hear his story. We appreciate the efforts of Brian Kahn, director of Holocaust Education for the Champaign-Urbana Jewish Federation, who facilitated the talk.

Dr. Gingold Bio

William (Baruch) Gingold, a Holocaust survivor from World War II, was born September 20, 1939, one day before the hospital, (in which he was born), was bombed and destroyed by Nazi, Germany. The Gingold’s (immediate family) were incarcerated in the Warsaw Ghetto until eventually escaping to the Russian border in January of 1942. Upon reaching the Russian encampment, they and other Jewish people were transported in trucks to trains which took them to a Siberian lumber work camp. In November of 1942 the Gingold’s were allowed to leave the camp and move about within Russia and eventually finding their way to Zhambly in Kazakhstan.

In the spring of 1945, (May 8^th), Hitler was dead and Germany surrenders. Upon those events, the Gingold’s reach their goal in September of 1945 by arriving at and entering the American Sector in occupied Berlin. Shortly thereafter in May of 1946, the Gingold’s were sent to the Föehrenwald Displacement Camp. After six years living at this camp, the Gingold’s emigrate to the United States of America in May of 1951 and arrive by boat to Ellis Island, NY. Soon thereafter the Gingold’s are resettled in Milwaukee, WI, where new lives and many transitions began in their start of the American dream and way of life.