USC Shoah Foundation Institute at OktaTARS – International Fellowship Program in Holocaust Education

The Holocaust Memorial Center in Budapest has launched a one-year long Fellowship Program in Holocaust Education for curriculum developers and teacher trainers.

The Fellowship – a unique initiative in Hungary - is a yearlong program during which participants have to develop their own project in Holocaust Education. The major milestones of the year include a one-week intensive seminar, individual and group consultations, a four-day study tour to Holocaust-related sites, and a closing conference. Participants receive professional support for the development and implementation of their projects from the experts of the program.

The first milestone of the program was a six-day seminar (November 2-7) with lectures and workshops of renowned international scholars from the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, Columbia University, Yad Vashem, the University of London, as well as experts from Hungary.

The weeklong seminar included a presentation of the Institute’s educational work as well as training on the Visual History Archive (VHA), which has been available at the Central European University since April 2009. After Andrea Szőnyi, the Institute’s Regional Consultant in Hungary and Peter Berczi, CEU Serials Librarian, introduced the VHA, the sixteen program participants from all over Hungary – university lecturers, lesson authors, and teacher trainers with various backgrounds including history, sociology, psychology, media, French language, museum pedagogy – had a chance to do some individual search in the VHA.

Nearly half of the fellowship participants (seven) are planning to feature the VHA or use testimonies in their projects. Some of the seven are planning to incorporate into their university courses visits to CEU with groups of students to search in the VHA.

Fellowship participants offered very positive feedback on the VHA session, making comments such as, “It was a major advantage to learn about the VHA. It will greatly help my work in the future,” and “Although I am familiar with the VHA, I could spend there hours any time… And I will!”

In addition to the workshop on the VHA at CEU, Martin Šmok, the Institute’s Senior International Program Consultant also led a session on Media and Nazi Propaganda.

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