Birmingham Holocaust Education Center
The Birmingham Holocaust Education Center is a nonprofit organization founded in 2002 by Phyllis Weinstein to educate the public about the state-sponsored genocide carried out by Germany's Nazi government in the 1930s and 1940s. The group aims to apply the lessons of that history toward the establishment of a more just, humane and tolerant society. The current interim executive director is Weinstein's daughter, Lynn Raviv.
The Education Center maintains a multimedia library of educational materials and offers teacher workshops, programs, visual exhibits and a speakers' bureau which includes holocaust survivors and their children, available to schools and community groups. From its founding until 2021, the center's offices were located in the Bayer Properties Building at 2222 Arlington Avenue. That summer, in advance of the redevelopment of the Bayer building, the center moved its program space to the former Discovery School at Temple Emanu-El.
The Birmingham Holocaust Education Center participated in the planting of an Anne Frank tree at Kelly Ingram Park in 2010 as a memorial to all who have suffered or died as a result of hatred and discrimination.
In 2013 the center began planning and raising funds for a Birmingham Holocaust Memorial Garden to be constructed near the 9-11 Memorial on 19th Street North. When the Center approached the Birmingham City Council in June 2016 to request that the city remove some landscaping to prepare the site, councilor Sheila Tyson argued against it, contrasting it with her attempts to win public funds to improve the privately-owned Shadow Lawn Cemetery.
Executive directors
- Rebecca Dobrinski, 2015–2017
- Joyce Spielberger, 2017–November 2019
- Melissa Self Patrick, November 2019–October 2020
- Lynn Raviv (interim), October 2020–
References
- Tomberlin, Michael (January 29, 2014) "Birmingham Holocaust Memorial Garden planned for downtown." The Birmingham News
- Archibald, John (June 22, 2016) "Alabama city councilwoman on Holocaust: "Dead is dead"." The Birmingham News
- Garrison, Greg (November 6, 2019) "Birmingham Holocaust Education Center hires new director." The Birmingham News
- Rebman, Stephanie (October 13, 2020) "Birmingham Holocaust Education Center has new interirm leader, space." Birmingham Business Journal