The Summer Undergraduate Research Fund (SURF) Award program provides thousands of dollars in support of undergraduate students’ summer research and creative projects. The SURF program is open to undergraduate students in all majors at all campuses who plan to graduate no earlier than December 2025. Students can apply for funding of up to $5,500 per student. Join us to learn how to apply and what makes an application successful.

This information session is sponsored by the Office of Undergraduate Research. Additional information on the SURF Award program can be found at https://ugradresearch.uconn.edu/surf/. If you require an accommodation to participate in this session, please contact the Office of Undergraduate Research at our@uconn.edu at least one week prior to the session.

Holocaust & Genocide Education Professional Development Program

Effective July 1, 2018, Connecticut became one of 29 states to mandate Holocaust and genocide education in public schools (Public Act 18-24, the Connecticut Holocaust and Genocide Education Awareness Act). To support this unfunded mandate, Dodd Human Rights Impact Programs, of the Gladstein Family Human Rights Institute at UConn, is proud to launch its professional development program for K-12 educators in Holocaust and genocide education.

Through a series of workshops facilitated by leading experts in the field, this program will equip teachers with the skills and knowledge to teach and discuss topics related to Holocaust and genocide education. Research has shown that such education has long-term effectiveness in reducing stereotyping, scapegoating, and hate.

The International Day of Commemoration and Dignity of the Victims of the Crime of Genocide and of the Prevention of this Crime is celebrated on December 9th each year. This day marks the adoption of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide by the United Nations in 1948. The convention was the first human rights treaty adopted by the UN.

About this Workshop

In recognition of this day, our first professional development workshop is titled “What is Genocide?” The workshop will review how the term genocide was coined by Raphael Lemkin, the contentious UN drafting process that led to the Genocide Convention, and how genocide differs from other related atrocity crimes (such as war crimes, crimes against humanity, and ethnic cleansing). The workshop also will introduce five stages of the process of genocide that can be used in the classroom to teach how we move from dehumanization to destruction.

The workshop will include teaching strategies, resources, and active learning exercises that help students understand the meaning of “genocide” and how the process of it unfolds. This workshop is appropriate for K-12 educators in History, Social Studies, English, Language Arts, or Literature that teach subject matter related to the Holocaust, genocide, or human rights.

The workshop will be facilitated by Dr. James Waller, Christopher J. Dodd Chair in Human Rights Practice and Director of Dodd Human Rights Impact Programs at UConn. Waller is a widely recognized scholar in the field of Holocaust and genocide studies and has led teacher trainings for the Washington State Holocaust Education Resource Center, the North Carolina Center for the Advancement of Teaching, the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, the Zoryan Institute, and the Max M. Kaplan Summer Institute at the Holocaust Museum Houston.

______________________________________________________________

The workshop is capped at 15 participants. Applications are due by midnight Friday, November 15.

Selected participants be notified on or before Friday, November 22, and will receive a $150 stipend for their participation, a free copy of Confronting Evil: Engaging Our Responsibility for Preventing Genocide (Oxford University Press, 2016), and a certificate of completion.

There is no fee for the workshop; lunch and parking will be provided.

Apply Now

__