Tuesday, Nov. 4, 2025
9 a.m. - 4:30 p.m.
Franciscan Renewal Center
5802 E. Lincoln Drive Scottsdale, AZ 85253
The Murray and Sabina Zemel z"l Educators Conference on the Holocaust and Genocide aims to aid Arizona teachers in building programs, developing curricula and sharing best practices in educating on the Holocaust and other genocides.
Please join us for a free all-day professional development opportunity for teachers.
Benefits for Participants:
Participants will obtain a certificate for CE units 30 participants will be
eligible to receive funds for substitute teachers, made possible by ASU Public HistoryFree lunch
Testimony from a Holocaust survivor
Free Holocaust books for educators
For more information, please email [email protected].
Schedule
Please register at the link below. For more information, please email [email protected].
Room: Community Life Center Rooms A/B
Led by: Dr. Stanley Mirvis, Director of ASU Jewish Studies, Harold and Jean Grossman Chair in Jewish Studies
Leslie Feldman, Executive Director, Phoenix Holocaust Association
Barry and Barbara Zemel
About Stanley: Stanley Mirvis is the director of Jewish Studies, the Harold and Jean Grossman Chair of Jewish Studies, and Associate Professor of History at Arizona State University. He is the author of The Jews of Eighteenth-Century Jamaica: A Testamentary History of a Diaspora in Transition (Yale 2020).
About Leslie: Motivated by a deep connection to her grandparents who were Holocaust survivors, Leslie Kornreich Feldman began her career in Washington, D.C. at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum where she worked in the Survivor Affairs division and for the Committee on Conscience. Since moving back home to Phoenix, she has worked for educational institutions in event planning and fundraising, as a Foundation Director, and an Alumni Director. She has also taught a high school course on Comparative Genocide. She is the first Executive Director of the Phoenix Holocaust Association. Leslie graduated Magna Cum Laude from Washington University in St. Louis with a degree in History. Her research focused on Modern Central Europe and the Holocaust. Her honors thesis brought to light the failures of the American Jewish community to assist Holocaust survivors in their resettlement upon the initial years after their immigration. She received her master’s degree in social work from Arizona State University. Leslie has shared her grandparents’ wartime experiences on many platforms, including CNN’s piece commemorating the 80th anniversary of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising. She and her husband, Andrew, are the proud parents of two daughters, Tyler and Olivia, who are the first 4Gs in their family.
Room: Community Life Center Rooms A/B
Led by Jennifer Rich, Chair and Associate Professor of Sociology, Executive Director for the Study of the Holocaust, Genocide and Human Rights at Rowan University
About Jennifer: Dr. Jennifer Rich is an Associate Professor and the Chair of the Department of Sociology and Anthropology at Rowan University in Glassboro, New Jersey, where she also serves as the Executive Director of Rowan’s Center for the Study of the Holocaust, Genocide, and Human Rights, and the founding director of Rowan’s Master of Arts in Holocaust and Genocide Education.
Dr. Rich’s research and teaching focus on Holocaust and genocide education and memory. She has written multiple academic articles, contributed opinion pieces and essays to several publications, including The Hechinger Report, The Conversation, The Philadelphia Inquirer, and The Washington Post, and is the author of "Keepers of Memory: The Holocaust and Transgenerational Identity" (Lexington Books, 2019), "Politics, Education, and Social Problems: Complicated Classroom Conversations" (Palgrave McMillon, 2021), and the forthcoming "Paper Tombs: The Text and Object of Post-Holocaust Memorial Books" (NYU Press, published in association with The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, 2026).
Foundations of Teaching the Holocaust
Room: Community Life Center Room A/B
Led by Ashley Crose, Social Studies educator
About the lecture: Be introduced to sound pedagogy for teaching the Holocaust. Appropriate for educators who are new to teaching the Holocaust, or those who would like a refresher on the fundamentals of teaching the subject matter.
About Ashley: Ashley Crose is a National Board-Certified Teacher as well as an award winning educator that teaches high school social studies at Saguaro High in Scottsdale, Arizona. Ashley was named the 2024 Gilder Lehrman Arizona History Teacher of the Year and will also be inducted into the Northern Arizona University College of Education Hall of Fame in 2025. He was also a 2022 Arizona Education Association Top 10 Teacher and Semifinalist for State of Arizona Teacher of the Year, the 2020 Scottsdale Charro’s Teacher of the Year and the 2019 Daughters of the American Revolution Outstanding Teacher of American History. In addition, Ashley is a United States Holocaust Memorial Museum Teacher Fellow class of 2020 and an Echoes and Reflections facilitator and teacher leader. Ashley also serves on the board of directors for NAU's AZK12 Center, the Arizona Council of Social Studies and the Phoenix Holocaust Association.
Deeper Dive: Women in the Holocaust
Room: Auditorium
Led by Kim Klett, English educator
About the lecture: During the Holocaust, many women’s experiences were shaped by their gender. Pre-war roles and responsibilities, anticipatory reactions to Nazi actions, German policy and treatment of men and women, and the responses of Jewish men and women to Nazi persecution effected women’s ordeals. In camps and elsewhere, women were subjected to humiliation and sexual assault, and in camps being pregnant or having children was a death sentence.
About Kim: Kim Klett taught English at Dobson High School since 1991 and recently retired. There, she developed a semester-long Holocaust Literature course, which she began teaching in 2000, and is now year-long. She also teachers an introductory class on Holocaust history at Scottsdale Community College. Klett is involved in Holocaust education through her work as a Museum Teacher Fellow ('03) with the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, a board member of the Phoenix Holocaust Association, a Teacher Ambassador for Defiant Requiem, and a Senior Facilitator for Echoes & Reflections. In her role as deputy executive director with the Educators' Institute for Human Rights, she has worked with teachers in Bosnia and other post-conflict societies. She was also a Carl Wilkens Fellow in 2010.
Teaching Genocide Comparatively
Room: Community Life Center Room C
Led by Jennifer Rich, Chair and Associate Professor of Sociology, Executive Director for the Study of the Holocaust, Genocide and Human Rights at Rowan University
About the lecture: This session will offer a comparative framework for Holocaust, genocide and Human Rights education in order to engage students in a deep understanding of the ongoing nature of genocide.
About Jennifer: Dr. Jennifer Rich is an Associate Professor and the Chair of the Department of Sociology and Anthropology at Rowan University in Glassboro, New Jersey, where she also serves as the Executive Director of Rowan’s Center for the Study of the Holocaust, Genocide, and Human Rights, and the founding director of Rowan’s Master of Arts in Holocaust and Genocide Education.
Dr. Rich’s research and teaching focus on Holocaust and genocide education and memory. She has written multiple academic articles, contributed opinion pieces and essays to several publications, including The Hechinger Report, The Conversation, The Philadelphia Inquirer, and The Washington Post, and is the author of "Keepers of Memory: The Holocaust and Transgenerational Identity" (Lexington Books, 2019), "Politics, Education, and Social Problems: Complicated Classroom Conversations" (Palgrave McMillon, 2021), and the forthcoming "Paper Tombs: The Text and Object of Post-Holocaust Memorial Books" (NYU Press, published in association with The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, 2026).
Provided free of cost.
Options:
- Tuna Salad Sandwich
- Mediterranean Veggie Sandwich (vegetarian)
- Fuji Apple Salad (vegetarian and gluten free)
ASU Public History Opportunities for Teachers
Room: Community Life Center Rooms A/B
Led by Erin Craft, Senior Program Coordinator, School of Historical, Philosophical and Religious Studies at ASU
About Erin: Erin Craft is the coordinator for the Public History Endowment, and works with faculty, students and outside partners to bring Public History projects to life. She also coordinates the Helios Education Mentorship endowment, used to help Arizona K-12 Educators teach history in their classrooms.
Defiant Requiem in the Classroom
Room: Community Life Center Rooms A/B
Led by Heather Land, Mountain View/English, Department Chair and Sandy Flayton, Gifted Specialist, Cocopah Middle School, Scottsdale Unified School District
About Heather: Heather Land has been teaching English for 24 years. She currently teaches Holocaust Literature and AP Literature at Mountain View High School. She is the English department chair, a WWII Museum Fellow, and Yad Vashem Museum Fellow, and serves on the Phoenix Holocaust Education Committee. Land holds an MA in Educational Leadership and has held multiple leadership positions that have improved teaching and learning at her school.
About Sandy: Sandy Flayton has taught the Holocaust in her high school English and middle school humanities classes for more than three decades. She worked with Gerda Weissman Klein as a producer and director for her book, turned into play “The Blue Rose” which was performed at Stage Brush Theater. She also helped to spearhead the production of "I Never Saw Another Butterfly" at Chaparral High School which continued on to the Edinburgh Festival Fringe. Like Heather, she is a Teacher Ambassador for Defiant Requiem, and often collaborates with Yad Vashem, just recently having her middle school class filmed for their new Echoes & Reflections ad campaign. She is the advisor of Cocopah Middle School’s ADL “No Place for Hate” program, and is the advisor of Cocopah Middle School’s Jewish Student Union.
Room: Community Life Center Rooms A/B
Introduction: Talli Dippold, Executive Director Hilton Family Holocaust Education Center
Hanna Miley, Holocaust survivor
About Hanna: Through rescue, loss, and eventual freedom — author, teacher, and speaker Hanna Zack Miley stands as a warm reminder of the power of forgiveness. In 1932, just 11 months before Hitler seized power — Hanna was born in the German city of Bonn. As anti-semitism increased her Jewish parents, Marcus and Amalie Zack, desperately sought ways of escape. On the evening of July 24, 1939, they were able to get Hanna onto a train to escape to England. They however, would not make it to safety. Her parents were forced from their home and deported to endure six months of inhumane conditions in the Łódź Ghetto before being murdered in Chelmno, Poland, on May 3, 1942.
Hanna has since discovered newfound freedom and joy in sharing her story around the world and through her writing and speaking. She and her husband George have been worldwide travelers for more than 50 years, teaching others about the transforming power of God and forgiveness even in the most painful circumstances. Today, they reside in Phoenix, Arizona.
Antisemitism Today
Room: Community Life Center Rooms A/B
Led by Ashley Crose, Social Studies educator
About the lecture: Antisemitism did not fade after World War II, but is a global phenomenon that continues to rise. Participation in this session will give you the tools needed to deliver thoughtful, engaging, and historically accurate lessons on contemporary antisemitism.
About Ashley: Ashley Crose is a National Board-Certified Teacher as well as an award winning educator that teaches high school social studies at Saguaro High in Scottsdale, Arizona. Ashley was named the 2024 Gilder Lehrman Arizona History Teacher of the Year and will also be inducted into the Northern Arizona University College of Education Hall of Fame in 2025. He was also a 2022 Arizona Education Association Top 10 Teacher and Semifinalist for State of Arizona Teacher of the Year, the 2020 Scottsdale Charro’s Teacher of the Year and the 2019 Daughters of the American Revolution Outstanding Teacher of American History. In addition, Ashley is a United States Holocaust Memorial Museum Teacher Fellow class of 2020 and an Echoes and Reflections facilitator and teacher leader. Ashley also serves on the board of directors for NAU's AZK12 Center, the Arizona Council of Social Studies and the Phoenix Holocaust Association.
30 Years after Srebrenica
Room: Community Life Center Room C
Led by David N. Gibbs, professor at the University of Arizona
About the lecture: 30 Years After Srebrenica: 2025 marks 30 years after the genocide in Srebrenica, Bosnia.
About David: David N. Gibbs is professor of history at the University of Arizona. He has published extensively on the international relations of sub-Saharan Africa, Eastern Europe, and Afghanistan, as well as US economic history. He has published three books, including Revolt of the Rich: How the Politics of the 1970s Widened America’s Class Divide, 2024. He is now working on a new book, to be entitled Guns, Butter, and the Politics of Permanent War: America After the Cold War.
Teaching Kindertransport
Room: Auditorium
Led by Kim Klett, English educator
About the lecture: One of the most moving stories of rescue during the Holocaust is the Kindertransport, the British-led effort that transported 10,000 Jewish children to safety in the U.K. Rescue during the Holocaust was not the norm, but it is an important topic for students to examine as a way to illuminate the rare bright spots amidst the overwhelming darkness of this historical tragedy.
About Kim: Kim Klett taught English at Dobson High School since 1991 and recently retired. There, she developed a semester-long Holocaust Literature course, which she began teaching in 2000, and is now year-long. She also teachers an introductory class on Holocaust history at Scottsdale Community College. Klett is involved in Holocaust education through her work as a Museum Teacher Fellow ('03) with the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, a board member of the Phoenix Holocaust Association, a Teacher Ambassador for Defiant Requiem, and a Senior Facilitator for Echoes & Reflections. In her role as deputy executive director with the Educators' Institute for Human Rights, she has worked with teachers in Bosnia and other post-conflict societies. She was also a Carl Wilkens Fellow in 2010.
Room: Auditorium
Led by Dr. Lauren Bairnsfather, CEO of The Anne Frank Center USA
About the Keynote: Includes a live performance of "A Conversation with Anne" and information on how teachers can host the performance in their schools.
About Lauren: Dr. Lauren Bairnsfather began her career at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum and most recently served as Executive Director of the Holocaust Center of Pittsburgh. She holds a Doctorate in History from the University of Texas at Austin and serves on the boards of the Association of Holocaust Organizations and the Council of American Jewish Museums.
This event is sponsored by:
Past Years
2024
2024 Theme: Resistance
October 29, 2023 | 9 a.m. - 3:30 p.m.
Burton Barr Central Library & Arizona Jewish Historical Society
2023
2023 Theme: Resistance
October 24, 2023 | 9:30 a.m. - 4 p.m.
Burton Barr Central Library & Arizona Jewish Historical Society
2022
October 25, 2022 | 10 a.m.
Coor Hall & Mirabella at ASU