“I can’t stand coffee!” she said, leaning forward to me before uttering back to the waitress. “Espresso please!” She giggled a little before telling me that espresso was her little dessert in the morning.

If you’ve ever watched genocide survivor testimony from the Visual History Archive and it spurned you to wonder what you can do to help prevent acts of intolerance and inhumanity, USC Shoah Foundation has an opportunity for you this holiday season.

With IWitness in Rwanda entering its third year, organizing partners and educators came together in Kigali last week for a reflective workshop that revealed the incredible impact IWitness has already had on students and teachers.

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.

Doris Lazarus is a docent at Illinois Holocaust Museum & Education Center, the first institution to pilot New Dimensions in Testimony (NDT), a collaboration between USC Shoah Foundation and USC Institute for Creative Technologies (ICT), in partnership with concept developer Conscience Display.

The Junior Intern Program at USC Shoah Foundation is entering its second year and looking for young people who are passionate about human rights and tolerance to be part of it.

A few weeks ago, USC Student Body President Rini Sampath posted on her Facebook page about incidents of hatred and intolerance on campus. A Saturday night after a USC football game, Sampath had been walking down USC’s Fraternity Row when a man leaned out his frat house window and hurled a racial epithet and a beverage cup at her.

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.

Roman Kent, Auschwitz survivor, speaking at the commemorationIt took months of preparation. But there is little one can do to prepare for a visit to Auschwitz.

USC Shoah Foundation and Discovery Education will host an interactive virtual experience for middle- and high-school students worldwide to provide a deeper understanding of the Holocaust.

As Ukraine embarks on an effort to radically change its law enforcement culture, USC Shoah Foundation’s international consultant in Ukraine, Anna Lenchovska, is using testimony to teach newly trained police officers tolerance and non-discrimination.

Auschwitz, the final destination of Jewish people from across Europe destined to be murdered as a part of the Nazi genocide of the Jews. Auschwitz, a place that housed prisoners of many religions, persuasions, minorities and nationalities, but whose evil reputation is seared onto our collective conscience because the five gas chambers at Birkenau were there for one reason only - to devour the lives of 960,000 Jews. Auschwitz, which has evolved into a universal symbol of man's inhumanity to man – and indeed it does remind us just how cruel human beings can be.

We have ample historical evidence that hateful words can be as dangerous as physical violence itself. German poet, Heinrich Heine said in 1821, “He who burns books will soon burn people.”