Center for Initiatives in Jewish Education, in partnership with USC Shoah Foundation, has developed a new online curriculum for Jewish education – A Testimony-Based Study of the Holocaust.

How is this curriculum different from all others? Every unit invites you to listen to survivors — to attentively listen to what is said and what is not said — and to weave their stories into the historical narrative you are learning. Fragments of testimony make this history more vivid, fleshing out the historical account recorded years after the events took place with survivor’s experiences.

Those who use this curriculum have access to online resources from the vast collection of materials in IWitness. We have enhanced these resources with maps and selections from the YIVO Encyclopedia of Jews in Eastern Europe, as well as other databases. Available together in one digital space, these comprehensive resources offer many learning possibilities and activities to the most curious of students and the most accomplished of teachers.

You will learn about depravity, evil, and even moments that can break people and shatter their worlds. You will also learn about hope, resilience and faith. We are obliged to commemorate the facts, and the facts of the Shoah are difficult at best. This challenging process raises questions, but doesn’t always offer answers. It invites inquiry.