Oksana Ishchenko

Despite living in Kiev her entire life, Oksana Ishchenko (right in photo) had never been to the site of the Babi Yar massacre in Ukraine, on the same side of the Dnieper river. In fact, before she was invited to train to give a Babi Yar IWalk – an educational program that put on a walk around the ravine guided by testimony clips from the Visual History Archive – this year, Ishchenko hadn’t learned very much about Babi Yar.

Board of Councilors Member Andy Friendly Publishes Memoir “Willing to Be Lucky: Adventures in Life and Television”


In his new memoir, Willing to be Lucky: Adventures in Life and Television, readers will not only get the inside scoop about working with Oprah Winfrey and George Clooney – they’ll also learn how his work with USC Shoah Foundation has been some of the most meaningful of his life.

Sydney and Mark Gordon

Though USC Shoah Foundation runs in 13-year-old Sydney Gordon’s veins – her dad Mark Gordon is a member of its Next Generation Council and her grandmother Ita Gordon has been an indexer and researcher there since the foundation’s inception in 1994 – Sydney admitted she was hesitant to choose it as her bat mitzvah project at first.