I’m speaking this evening in Rochester, NY. You should be able the watch the ceremony beginning at 7pm EST at this feed:

Through the Eyes of Liberators: History Comes to Life

Yom HaShoah, Holocaust Remembrance 2015

Matthew A. Rozell will be keynote speaker at this year’s Yom HaShoah program, providing fascinating insights in his many years connecting Holocaust survivors with their liberators – soldiers of WWII.

The Federation’s Center for Holocaust Awareness and Information (CHAI) presents our annual commemoration of victims and survivors of the Shoah, this year entitled “Through the Eyes of Liberators: History Comes to Life,” on Wednesday, April 15, 2015 at 7 pm at the Jewish Community Center.

Rozell, a teacher of history at Hudson Falls (NY) High School has provided students with life-changing experiences that have underscored his driving missions — to promote history and Holocaust education as something vital and alive and to foster a curiosity and attention to the suffering of others that leads to passionate involvement.

Rozell is recognized as a leader in World War II and Holocaust history. He and his students have personally interviewed more than 200 WWII veterans and have published many stories that would have otherwise been lost. He has been instrumental in reuniting over 275 Holocaust survivors with several American soldiers who liberated them from a train in Nazi Germany on April 13, 1945 and nursed them back to health. Rozell has organized or helped facilitate powerful reunions, witnessed by thousands of students.
In 2008, Rozell was awarded a Museum Teacher Fellowship at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum for his work in Holocaust education; he has also been the subject of a documentary, “Honoring Liberation,” produced by the museum. His work has also been modeled in educational programs across the nation. In 2009, Rozell and his students were named ABC World News “Persons of the Week” by Diane Sawyer.
Learn more at his website,TeachingHistoryMatters.com.
Photo above: Moment of Liberation. Credit: Major Clarence L. Benjamin, 743rd Tank Battalion