Just two weeks ago, USC Shoah Foundation launched its Armenian Genocide Collection in the Visual History Archive; now, 12 of those initial 60 testimonies are already available for students and educators to view in IWitness.

Get a behind-the-scenes look at how two USC students composed a piano piece inspired by Holocaust survivor testimony in the new documentary Melodies of Auschwitz.

Wolf Deane plays the song composed and sang by Jews in the Lodz ghetto in Poland. This testimony clip and melody is featured in the short film Melodies of Auschwitz.   

(Alex Biniaz-Harris, left, and Ambrose Soehn)The composers behind the three-movement piano piece featured in the documentary Melodies of Auschwitz, now playing on Comcast Xfinity’s Days of Remembrance: PastFORWARD broadcast, reunited for a screening and concert at USC’s Brain and Creativity Institute this week and spoke candidly about their journey from page to performance.

Edith Umugiraneza was born and raised in Rwanda and survived the 1994 Rwandan Tutsi Genocide but lost most of her family including her mother. Edith wrote this poem not only as an ode to her mother but as a promise to continue her mother's work of helping others.

As part of USC Shoah Foundation’s Preserving the Legacy initiative, 281 testimonies from Holocaust Museum Houston are currently being indexed for integration into the Visual History Archive.

The second annual Greenberg Research Fellowship has been awarded to Julia Werner, a PhD candidate in history at Humboldt University, Berlin, who will combine testimony with her study of photography of occupied Poland during World War II.

USC Shoah Foundation is currently in the second year of Days of Remembrance: PastFORWARD, a five-year partnership with Comcast to provide USC Shoah Foundation content to Comcast Xfinity customers On Demand, through the Xfinity TV Go app and online, in conjunction with the U.S. National Days of Remembrance, a commemoration of the Holocaust held every spring.

Chaim Borenstein remembers the brutality of the SS guards while imprisoned in the Warsaw Ghetto in Nazi occupied Poland.

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