HEFNU's September 5 Letter to the University of Oregon
September 8, 2025
Letter to the University of Oregon regarding plan to eliminate Holocaust Studies
September 5, 2025
President Scholz, Provost and Senior Vice President Long, Chief Financial Officer Moffitt, the Board of Trustees, Dean Poulsen, Director Aneesh, and Jordan Schnitzer and the Harold & Arlene Schnitzer CARE Foundation,
On behalf of the Holocaust Educational Foundation of Northwestern University (HEFNU), I write to urge the University of Oregon and its College of Arts and Sciences to reconsider its decision to eliminate its Holocaust Studies program. It is imperative that esteemed institutions such as the University of Oregon be at the forefront of combatting Holocaust distortion and rising antisemitism through education.
By way of background, the Holocaust Educational Foundation was founded in 1976 by Theodore Zev Weiss, a Holocaust survivor and educator, with the goal of encouraging Holocaust scholarship and instruction. In July 2013, the Foundation joined Northwestern University. Since its inception, HEFNU’s mission has been to advance and expand university-level Holocaust education in the U.S. and abroad by creating educational opportunities for students and faculty and developing the programs that remain at the heart of what the Foundation does – teaching and research grants, Holocaust Studies Institutes, and the renowned Lessons and Legacies Conferences – all of which are available to scholars at the University of Oregon (https://hef.northwestern.edu/).
Since the Holocaust ended in 1945, the genocide has become a touchstone for understanding and drawing attention to many forms of violence. Unfortunately, a variety of social, political, and other actors a have distorted and/or denied the Holocaust. Holocaust distortion and denial range from outright rejection of the historical fact that the Holocaust happened, to minimization of the number of Jews murdered, to claims by collaborator states of victimhood. These forms of distortion and denial are also forms of antisemitism. Such distortion and denial undermine truth and scholarship and thus should be of concern to all institutions of higher learning – especially considering the well-documented rise in antisemitism in the US and around the world.[i]
These trends are difficult to stem or turn but as one scholar notes, “We need to know more about history and religion. The humanities don’t inoculate against hatred, but they give us the tools to fight it.”[ii] And Holocaust Studies in the United States are an example to universities abroad. In short, this is exactly the wrong time to consider eliminating a program that educates about the most egregious episode of antisemitic violence the world has seen.
The Schnitzers’ recent, generous donation to the School of Global Studies and Languages should bolster the school’s ability to continue important educational programs, including Holocaust Studies. Indeed, the stated goal of the gift is “to recruit and retain top professors in global studies and languages.”[iii]
The elimination of Holocaust Studies would do a grave disservice to the University of Oregon’s ability to offer robust educational opportunities about the history of the modern world.
Once again, we urge you to reconsider these decisions while there is still time and to retain the faculty and programs housed in the Schnitzer School of Global Studies and Languages.
Sincerely,
Sarah M. Cushman, PhD
Director, HEFNU
[i] https://www.fcas.org/research/survey-finds-jewish-hate-rising/; https://www.adl.org/sites/default/files/pdfs/2025-05/j7-annual-report-on-antisemitism-2025.pdf, p. 2; https://www.ajc.org/AntisemitismReport2024#prioritybox.
[ii] Mark Oppenheimer, https://source.washu.edu/2025/03/washu-expert-getting-to-root-of-rising-antisemitism-in-america/.
[iii] https://www.opb.org/article/2025/05/13/university-of-oregon-receives-dollar25-million-donation-from-schnitzer-family-to-expand-global-studies/