The International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE) has once again awarded IWitness its Seal of Alignment for another two years, recognizing IWitness’s focus on building students’ technology skills according to ISTE Standards.

The Boys & Girls Clubs of Chicago will soon incorporate IWitness into some of their programs following workshops with students and program leaders last week.

Many survivors of Auschwitz talk about hearing music when they first arrived at the camp or while they were marching to work each morning. One of the musicians they heard may very well have been Anita Lasker Wallfisch.

Sally Ingram was first introduced to USC Shoah Foundation years ago, when her mother-in-law, Marione Ingram, gave her testimony to the Visual History Archive about her life in hiding during the war. Now, Ingram is using testimony and the IWitness Video Challenge to inspire her middle school students to deeply engage with survivors’ stories.

Auschwitz: The Past is Present was a once-in-a-lifetime experience for not just the teachers and students who attended, but the USC Shoah Foundation staff who led the program as well.

Ford will be recognized for his leadership and corporate citizenry around education and community.

Herman Cohn recalls watching the parade in Nazi Germany for Hitler’s birthday in 1933 and how terrified he felt as a young boy.  

Toni Nickel is preparing for a career of teaching the Holocaust by serving as the first-ever USC Shoah Foundation intern at Texas A&M University. The A.I. and Manet Schepps Foundation funded a three-year, $75,000 initiative to support a teaching fellow and intern at Texas A&M. The fellowship will instruct professors on ways to integrate the USC Shoah Foundation’s Visual History Archive of Holocaust and other genocide survivors’ testimonies into their teaching.

USC Shoah Foundation’s Karen Jungblut and Cecilia Chan spoke on a panel about the power of testimony at University of Pennsylvania’s Alumni Weekend last Friday.

Detroit, Michigan — May 13, 2015 — Steven Spielberg, founder of USC Shoah Foundation – The Institute for Visual History and Education, will present William Clay Ford, Jr., executive chairman of Ford Motor Company, with the Institute’s Ambassador for Humanity Award at the organization’s annual gala, taking place this year in Detroit on Sept. 10. Ford will be recognized for his leadership and corporate citizenry around education and community. Mickey Shapiro, real estate developer and longstanding member of the Institute’s Board of Councilors, is the event’s co-chairman.

Kori Street gave a presentation titled “Listen and Listen Again: Thinking About Testimony and Tolerance” for over 50 staff who work with people who have been granted asylum.

The 45-minute live-streamed broadcast provided a personalized look at USC Shoah Foundation’s recent trip to Poland for the 70th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz.

To commemorate the 100th anniversary of the Armenian Genocide and the first integration of Armenian Genocide testimonies into the Visual History Archive, USC Shoah Foundation released one clip from the Armenian Genocide collection on the Institute’s website each day in April 2015 for the next 30 days. To help put the clips into perspective, each one is introduced by experts in the field of the Armenian Genocide. The presenters also recommend additional resources for those who would like to learn more.

"Singing in the Lion's Mouth: Music as Resistance to Violence" is an event sponsored by USC Visions and Voices, and organized by the USC Shoah Foundation Center for Advanced Genocide Research in collaboration with the Thornton School of Music. The event will include two days of programming that highlight the use of music as a tool to resist oppression and spread awareness.

Melanie Wallis recalls how she settled in Detroit, Michigan after immigrating to the United States in 1947.

Stefan recalls the evening of November 4, 1941, when leaving the theater where he worked in Torun, Poland, he encounters a German soldier who turns out to be a man named Willi, his first real romance.Foreign words in this video clip:Ersatzkaffee (German): substitute coffee

In the fascinating short documentary The Past is Present, teachers and students share their experience going to Poland to learn from testimony and commemorate the 70th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz.

After several months together, Willi must break the news to Stefan that he is being transferred to the Eastern front.

On the way to show his friend Zygmund the shed where Stefan and Willi would regularly meet, the two encounter three men who had just escaped the Stutthof concentration camp.Foreign words in this video clip:pedo (Polish): derogatory word for a gay person

After time goes by without receiving a letter from Willi, Stefan decides to write the German soldier himself. His decision to put down his return address on the envelope seals his fate. Not long after, September 19, 1942, the Gestapo bring Stefan in for questioning.Foreign words in this clip:Haftbefehl (German): arrest warrantHandschenkel (meant to say Handschellen) (German): handcuffsVerhöre (German): police interrogations

After his arrest in September 1942, Stefan Kosinski was incarcerated while awaiting his trial. In this clip, he recounts the conditions in the jail and his memory of seeing his mother out the window of his jail cell keeping vigil. She is also present during his trial before the Nazi court, which sentences Stefan to five years hard labor. Foreign words in this clip:pedo (Polish): derogatory term for a gay personschwul (German): gay, homosexualZuchthaus (German): penitentiary

Watch Judith Goldstein’s full testimony from the Visual History Archive as part of Comcast’s Days of Remembrance: PastFORWARD broadcast April 15-June 1, 2015. From her childhood in Vilna, Poland, to her adult life in the United States, the arts have rarely been very far from Judith Goldstein.

Hannah Altbush describes the horrible experience of being expelled from her school in Nazi Germany simply because she was Jewish.

Stefan (Teofil) Kosinski’s testimony is the only English-language testimony we have in the Visual History Archive from a homosexual survivor, which is also remarkable for the fact that Stefan is not a native English speaker.

As a young girl Hedy Epstein returned home from school in Nazi Germany to find her house empty, locked and her parents nowhere to be found. She describes the terrifying confrontation with a Nazi when looking for her parents.

John K. Roth Professor of History and George R. Roberts Fellow at Claremont McKenna College, and 2015 USC Shoah Foundation Yom Hashoah Scholar in Residence Dr. Wendy Lower discusses the role of German women in the Nazi killing fields.  

Three women tell their stories of struggle, courage, and resilience, and share their vision of rebuilding societies broken by genocide. 

USC Shoah Foundation Center for Advanced Genocide Research Center Fellow Peg Levine, PhD, EdD, discusses her term Ritualcide and its application during the Cambodian Genocide.

Yehuda Danzing remembers the liberation of Bergen-Belsen by British Armed Forces in April 1945. He describes the confusion of liberation since he didn’t understand English and he thought the British soldiers announcing his freedom were Nazi soldiers giving more orders.