Programs
Speakers Bureau:
We at
the HRC are fortunate to be able to draw upon a small group of local Holocaust
Survivors in our community who are willing and able to share their personal
experiences with students and teachers in our area. We have both men and women
Survivors from all parts of Europe, including
Germany,
Poland, Czechoslovakia and Holland, and each one has a special story to
tell of how they survived the Holocaust. The Survivors generally only speak to
groups that have already had some foundation laid for the history of the
Holocaust in Europe, 1933-1945, so that the
audience will have a context for their experiences. The Survivors only accept
engagements at schools and institutions within one half-hour's drive of the
metropolitan Buffalo
area. Anyone wishing to hear a Survivor's testimony who is not within that
distance, can arrange to show videotaped testimony from our library of tapes.
If you
wish to schedule either a Survivor visit or a video showing, you are encouraged
to contact the HRC as soon as possible as demand for both during the school year
is always high.
A donation to our center in honor of the
speaker is suggested.
Our address, phone and fax numbers are found at the top of this
page - additionally, you can e-mail us at
HRC1050@aol.com.
You can
also draw from our archive of Online Survivor
Testimony by clicking here.
Book
Boxes:
In 1994
Assemblyman Sam Hoyt provided the HRC with a memberline grant that funded a very
special project... 11 portable libraries (book boxes) of Holocaust-related books
were purchased and assembled by the
Resource
Center. The boxes are
available for loan to all area schools for a month. These age-appropriate
materials are for students in grades 6-8 and 9-12 respectively. Each box
contains over 35 titles of both fiction and non-fiction dealing with Holocaust
issues and themes. Teachers are also able to borrow related Holocaust videos,
posters and curricula. Every year our book boxes reach thousands of students in
our area.
The
Holocaust Resource Center also has available for loan 206 copies of the book
Daniel’s Story (appropriate for grades 5-8), 50 copies of the following
books: Night (appropriate for grades 10-12), The Cage, by Ruth
Sender, The Last Seven Months of Anne Frank's Life, by Willy Lindwer,
The Other Vitims by Ina Friedman and All But My Life, by Gerda Klein,
which may be borrowed as classroom sets.
See our
Library Videos Section for
more details
Memorial Services:
A
community-wide Memorial Service to the victims of the Holocaust is co-ordinated
and co-sponsored each year by the HRC. On the Sunday between Rosh Hashanah and
Yom Kippur, the community gathers at the Holocaust Memorial at Brith Sholem
cemetery to remember those who perished in the Holocaust.
Teacher / Student Trips to the U.S. Holocaust
Memorial
Museum in Washington,
D.C.
Every
year, the Holocaust Resource
Center takes 30-40 English and Global
Studies teachers to the United States Holocaust Memorial
Museum in Washington D.C..
As part
of our Distance Learning course for students in Erie 1 and Erie 2 school
districts, trips to
Washington
to tour the USHMM were sponsored by the HRC at the completion of every semester.
Participants are responsible for a non-refundable registration fee and the
balance of the cost of the trip is borne by the Holocaust Resource Center of
Buffalo.
Teacher Conferences.
The HRC presents workshops for middle and
high school teachers. These workshops can be day - long or in a series of weekly
workshops (15 hour) through Teacher Centers in Western New York school
districts. Experts in Holocaust education and Survivor testimony highlight these
programs. For further information, please call Sandy Saada, Executive
Director, at 716-634-9535.
Watch
the Events space to see when our next
Teacher Conference is being planned.
Annual Arts and Writing Contest.
The HRC
along with the Freeland and Joffe Foundations sponsors an annual Arts and
Writing Contest, which asks area Middle School and High School students to
contemplate a Holocaust-related topic and respond to it in either the visual
media or the written word. The resulting works are judged by category and grade
level, and at the end of the school year the best are selected for special
awards, including books and savings bonds. The Mary Deane Freeland award is
given to the school library of the student whose entry in the Arts and Writing
contest is judged "Best in Show". The award is a collection of Holocaust books
valued at $250.
Winners
will be selected in April.
Congratulations to Andrew Beiter of Springville Middle School for
receiving the 2008 Irena Sendler Award
