Sedda Antekelian, a member of USC Shoah Foundation’s education team, never knew her own great grandmother had recorded testimony about surviving the Armenian Genocide. Hearing her great grandmother’s voice for the first time has brought Sedda closer to family, filled in gaps about her own history, and opened even more questions.

April 7 is the International Day of Reflection on the 1994 Genocide Against the Tutsi in Rwanda. The day of remembrance marks the start of the 100-day genocidal campaign in which an estimated 800,000 Rwandans—mainly Tutsis and moderate Hutus—were killed by well-organized mobs of Hutu extremists. Edith Umugiraneza, a survivor of the 1994 Genocide Against the Tutsi in Rwanda who now works for USC Shoah Foundation, says false information and manipulated facts helped ignite and sustain the violence, and even today threaten to distort our understanding of events.

The USC Shoah Foundation mourns the passing of Damas Gisimba, the director of a Kigali orphanage who sheltered and saved the lives of over 400 people, mostly children, during the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi in Rwanda. Later in life, he headed the Gisimba Memorial Center, a charitable organization that provided after-school programs for disadvantaged children and served as a place of remembrance for victims of the genocide.

Steve's passion for fighting antisemitism and educating the next generation led him to join the Board of Councilors in 1997 when the organization was in its infancy. He has remained committed to our mission, serving as Chair of the Board of Councilors from 2015 to 2019.

New York, NY (October 14, 2024) —Nearly 700 guests convened for an unforgettable evening of celebration and inspiration at the USC Shoah Foundation’s Ambassadors for Humanity Gala. This milestone event marked the institute's 30th anniversary, honoring the resilience of Holocaust survivors while emphasizing the critical importance of preserving their testimonies for future generations. 

The Division of Academic Programs at the USC Shoah Foundation invites applications for its Sandy and Steve Cozen Graduate Top-Off Fellowship for the 2025-2026/ 2026-2027 academic years.

We are grateful that so many of these survivors, partners, friends, and family members have entrusted us to share their stories for future generations, and for the passion and dedication they brought in support of our mission.

For weeks, Eva (Geiringer) Schloss and a small band of young women had been exploring the far corners of the women’s section of Auschwitz-Birkenau, alone and, for the first time in months, unwatched. It was January 1945, and Allied forces were nearing the camp. The SS had already evacuated most of the surviving inmates by way of middle-of-the-night marches in freezing temperatures. The gas chambers and crematoria had been destroyed. The SS guards had fled.

On January 27, 1945, Allied Forces liberated the camps at Auschwitz-Birkenau. Each year on this anniversary, the world observes International Holocaust Remembrance Day, a solemn occasion for us all to affirm our commitment to Holocaust remembrance and education and to a world that respects and knows the histories of the victims and survivors of this terrible crime. 

The Following Op-Ed was published in U.S. News by the USC Shoah Foundation's Finci-Viterbi Executive Director, Robert J. Williams, Ph.D. January 27, 2025   As we commemorate International Holocaust Remembrance Day today and the 80th anniversary of the liberation of the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp, we find ourselves at a critical juncture in history.

LOS ANGELES, CA (Feb. 11, 2025) — The USC Shoah Foundation announced the appointment of Dr. Brian Hughes as the inaugural Director of its Countering Antisemitism Laboratory, marking a significant expansion of the institute's mission to combat hatred through research, education and action.

Inside a Warsaw light stage surrounded by nine cameras, prominent historian and journalist Marian Turski in late June completed the first ever Polish-language interactive biography. Conducted by USC Shoah Foundation and the Museum of the History of Polish Jews in Warsaw (POLIN), Turski’s interview was a truly international collaboration involving 15 team members from Belgium, Germany, Hungary, Poland, the U.K and the U.S.

We are saddened to learn of the passing of György Kun, who gave his testimony in October 1999 in Budapest, Hungary. His daughter, Andrea Szonyis, an educator and former colleague at the USC Shoah Foundation, authored a story in the series "Voices from the Archive” about her father.

LOS ANGELES – April 26, 2012 – Arnold Spielberg, father of USC Shoah Foundation Institute Founder Steven Spielberg, was honored today with the Institute’s inaugural Inspiration Award at a private luncheon in Los Angeles. Arnold was recognized for his many years of mentorship and support of the Institute’s work, especially in the area of humanity through technology.

On April 21 through 23, the USC Shoah Foundation Institute participated in an international conference, "History Unlimited: Probing the Ethics of Holocaust Culture." The conference asked the question of whether ethical or aesthetic limits should be placed on how the Holocaust is represented in fiction or nonfiction.

On April 20, at Los Angeles City Hall, Councilmember Paul Krekorian, together with co-host Councilmember Eric Garcetti, recognized the USC Shoah Foundation Institute and the Armenian Film Foundation for working jointly to preserve memories of survivors and other witnesses of the Armenian Genocide.

The University of Haifa has become the first university in Israel with access to the USC Shoah Foundation Institute’s Visual History Archive, a searchable repository of nearly 52,000 video interviews with Holocaust survivors and other witnesses.

La 51ème édition du Concours national de la Résistance et de la Déportation avait retenu pour l’année scolaire 2011-2012 le thème suivant : “Résister dans les camps nazis”. Un groupe de huit élèves de 3ème du collège de Colombes (Hauts-de-Seine) a choisi de traiter ce thème à travers un projet audiovisuel portant sur la révolte des Sonderkommandos d’Auschwitz-Birkenau le 7 octobre 1944. Ce travail s’est appuyé sur les récits de onze témoins des événements, récits issus de la collection de témoignages du Shoah Foundation Institute.

On June 23, the American Association of School Librarians (AASL) named IWitness, the Institute’s new online resource for teachers and students, one of the “top 25 Internet sites for enhancing learning and curriculum development” for school librarians and teachers.

Award-winning blog Free Technology for Teachers featured the Shoah Foundation Institute's new online educational resource, IWitness, citing its archive of videos, interactive activities, and teacher-moderation tools.

As a part of Yad Vashem's 8th International Conference on Holocaust Education taking place in Jerusalem, Martin Šmok, the USC Shoah Foundation Institute's Senior International Program Consultant, will present the IWitness educational platform on June 20, 2012.

Are you an educator? What question would you like to see incorporated into an IWitness activity? Share your voice.

In July 2012, the USC Shoah Foundation Institute convened the inaugural workshop of “Teaching with Testimony for the 21st Century,” a professional development program for teachers in Europe centered on the educational use of Holocaust eyewitness testimony.

The exhibit is part of UNESCO’s International Holocaust Remembrance Day 2013 activities; commemorated annually on January 27, the anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau, International Holocaust Remembrance Day pays tribute to the victims of the Holocaust.

USC Shoah Foundation – The Institute for Visual History and Education has added a collection of testimonies of survivors and rescuers from the 1994 Rwandan Tutsi genocide to its Visual History Archive. This marks the first integration of testimonies outside of Holocaust survivors and witnesses into the Visual History Archive.

In the nineteen nineties, videotape was the most effective format on which to record the testimonies of Holocaust survivors and other witnesses. But like all physical storage media, tape has a shelf life, and in 2008 the Institute and USC Information Technology Services (ITS) started a multimillion-dollar project to digitize the entire Visual History Archive.

BALTIMORE, MARYLAND—Echoes and Reflections, a groundbreaking multimedia curriculum on the Holocaust, has been honored for its use of visual history testimony and its educat

L'USC Shoah Foundation – Institut pour l’histoire visuelle et l’éducation, a organisé une exposition qui a été présentée au siège de l’UNESCO, à Paris. Cette exposition fut l’un des volets de la Journée internationale du souvenir de l’Holocauste pour l’année 2013. Chaque année, le 27 janvier – date anniversaire de la libération d’Auschwitz-Birkenau –, il est rendu hommage aux victimes de l’Holocauste.

U příležitosti Mezinárodního dne památky holocaustu, v rámci druhého ročníku programu půldenních regionálních seminářů byly českým učitelům ve dnech 21. až 23. ledna představeny informační zdroje vytvořené čtyřmi partnerskými institucemi: experti z Jad Vašem, Oddělení pro vzdělávání a kulturu Židovského muzea v Praze, Památníku Terezín a USC Shoah Foundation společně s místními aktivisty a za podpory karlovarského inspektorátu České školní inspekce představili vzdělávací materiály vytvořené jejich organizacemi. Seminář tentokrát navštívil Karlovy Vary, Ostrov nad Ohří a Plzeň.

Tři roky po zřízení Centra vizuální historie Malach na Karlově Univerzitě v Praze coby přístupového místa k Archivu vizuální historie je jeho význam pro výzkumné a vzdělávací aktivity založené na zkoumání svědectví pamětníků neustále potvrzován.