During the last few months IHE has engaged in exciting work, ranging from attending the Belfer Conference for Educators to visiting the Anne Frank Center for a Trainer Workshop. Please find updates and information below.
Happenings in Holocaust Education
Our goal is to ensure that the tragedy and history of the Holocaust are remembered, that appropriate, fact-based instruction and materials are available to students, educators, and the public to enable them to learn the lessons of the Holocaust and that, as a result, we inspire our community to create a more just and equitable society. 
Holocaust Exhibit at Wesleyan
“Americans and the Holocaust”
Learning Commons, Cochrane-Woods Library

"A traveling exhibition from the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum that examines Americans’ responses to Nazism, war and genocide in Europe during the 1930s and 1940s. What did Americans know, and what more could have been done? Made possible by the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum and the American Library Association. " - from website

Belfer Conference for Educators
On Monday, August 2 and Tuesday August 3, I attended the Belfer National Conference for Educators offered through the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. The conference was held virtually and was truly amazing.
One of the highlights was keynote speaker, Derek Black. Mr. Black grew up among one of the leading families of the white nationalist movement in the United States, Derek helped advocate for and support the white nationalist cause—until he went to college and was invited to join in Shabbat
dinners with Jewish classmates. Mr. Black spoke about how he developed a different understanding on hate and the white nationalist movement. His presentation was truly eye opening.  The other presentation that I learned much from was from Dr. Arie Kruglanski a Holocaust survivor. Dr. Kruglanski, is a distinguished professor of psychology at the University of Maryland, in his presentation he shared his experience as a child living in the Lodz ghetto and how he and his family survived the Holocaust. Later in life, he was inspired to study human behavior and what motivates people to embrace extremist ideologies.

-Scott Littky, IHE Executive Director
USC Anne Frank Center
Our Education Manager, Kael Sagheer, was able work with 20 others at the Anne Frank Center at the University of South Carolina this summer. She attended a Train the Trainer workshop where she learned more about the exhibit and the peer-training materials from Amsterdam - while also talking and sharing about Holocaust education with some incredible people. Anne Frank and her diary is probably one of the best-known stories about the Holocaust. This exhibit and training, however, is able to take students through Anne’s personal story and this particular historical event into students’ own stories and ideas for the future. Kael and the IHE are very excited to be working with the Anne Frank Center and offering this exhibit to Nebraska schools.
Kael Sagheer, IHE Education Coordinator (4th from left, back) and Megan Helberg, Nebraska Teacher of the Year and Holocaust Educator (2nd from right, back) at the Anne Frank Center, University of South Carolina.

IHE Launches a New Multi-Year Partnership
In partnership with the Anne Frank Center at the University of South Carolina, IHE will be able to offer the Anne Frank: A History of Today traveling exhibit and peer training to schools across Nebraska. Initially slated to begin during the 2020-21 school year, the program was set to launch in the Sandhills after a peer-training session that included Burwell, O’Neill, Ansley, and Arcadia high schools.
Unfortunately, a week later, Covid-19 put everything on hold. This year, the exhibit will be traveling to schools in ESU 4, 5, and 10. We would like to thank the Staenberg Family Foundation Anything Grant, Gloria & Howard Kaslow, Bruce Meyers, Marty Tichauer, Kelly Tichauer Kirk, and Randi Tichauer Wisecarver for making this year possible. IHE will be able to keep the exhibit as long as we can keep it moving throughout the region and can find annual funding. Our hope is to continue offering this opportunity to Nebraska schools free of charge in order to make Holocaust education more accessible and make more relationships with teachers across the state. If your school is interested, you can find more information here.
The Institute for Holocaust Education provides educational resources, workshops, survivor testimony, and integrated arts programming to students, educators, and the public. The IHE provides support to Holocaust survivors in our community.
Educator Spotlights
Heidi Reinhart
In her over 27 years of education in Oklahoma and Nebraska, Heidi Reinhart has been a classroom teacher, assistant principal for academics, and a softball coach. Heidi earned her bachelor’s degree from Oklahoma Baptist University and her Master’s degree through Oklahoma State University. She has primarily taught at the high school level but did have a brief three-year stint teaching middle school. Today she calls Duchesne Academy of the Sacred Heart her teaching home.
 
Heidi attended an Echoes and Reflections conference and then went through the Bearing Witness for Catholic School educators program while a middle school teacher.
 
She recognized that there didn’t seem to be enough time in the history survey classes at Duchesne to allow students to learn about the history of the Holocaust and the relevance today, so she asked her principal if she could design an elective course. It has been going strong for several years now. This year, there are 19 students in the one-semester class. Students in the class often participate in IHE’s Tribute to the Rescuer’s essay competition.
 
“The opposite of love is not hate, it's indifference.”
“This Elie Wiesel quote is at the top of my syllabus for the Lessons of the Holocaust elective that we offer. It drives my determination for teaching the course to as many students as possible. I believe in the power of education to drive out indifference, to create a ‘social awareness which impels to action’ and prevent future atrocities. And if one life could be made better through my efforts, it will all be worth it.”
 
Heidi is married to Tom Reinhart. They have three children: Meg, Clare, Patrick. They have two dogs Rez and Scout. If Heidi isn’t reading a book, she can be found cheering for her kids on the softball or soccer fields.
Trysta Asche
In her time as a secondary Language Arts teacher and Library Media Specialist, Trysta Asche has been dedicated to fostering student growth through academic progress and experiences.

Asche received her BA in Education in 2012 and an MS in Education in 2018, both from the University of Nebraska at Kearney. After spending time as a Library Media Specialist for Arcadia Public Schools, she served as a Language Arts Instructor for the same district. In 2021 she made the transition to be a 8-12 Language Arts Instructor in Loup City, Nebraska. When she is not in the classroom, Asche is a dedicated volleyball coach.

In 2018 she attended the Belfer Conference for educators, and has taken part in multiple Echoes and Reflections programs since 2018. In 2020 she was chosen to be a USHMM Museum Teacher Fellow. As a devoted Holocaust educator, Asche say the following:
"Learning about the Holocaust has permanently changed my perspective on many aspects of my own everyday life. The knowledge that I have gained from programs provided by the IHE, USHMM, and Echoes and Reflection has made me want to share my feelings and experiences with every individual who crosses my path, and has given me an even stronger purpose in implementing and utilizing Holocaust education within each of my own classes. I truly believe that these lessons and stories can change lives, and can give our students an opportunity to use their knowledge of these atrocities as a way to develop a new way of thinking and perspectives on how they can positively contribute to changes we need in society today and into the future."
What We Are Reading

“Beyond race, class, or other factors, a powerful caste system influences people’s lives and behavior and the nation’s fate. Linking the caste systems of America, India, and Nazi Germany, Wilkerson explores eight pillars that underlie caste systems across civilizations, including divine will, bloodlines, and stigma. ..She documents how the Nazis studied the racial systems in America to plan their outcasting of the Jews…and the effects of this hierarchy on our [own] culture and politics. [And] she points forward to ways America can move beyond the artificial and destructive separations of human division, toward hope in our common humanity. "