IHE/WPS/ESU2 brings back Holocaust survivor assemblies; Stories to be shared on stage March 24, 2026
Launch the media gallery 1 player - media #1Wahoo Public Schools is partnering with the Institute for Holocaust Education to bring in speakers for this year's Week of Understanding. (March 24th, 2026)
Cyd Gottlieb will be the first of two speakers speaking for the event taking place on March 24th. She will be speaking on behalf of her Holocaust Survivor Grandparents in the first session going from 10:00-11:30 a.m. WPS is pleased to once again work with ESU2 to host this annual event in recognition of the Week of Understanding, sponsored by the Institute for Holocaust Education in Omaha. Both sessions are open to the public.
“To forget would be not only dangerous but offensive; to forget the dead would be akin to killing them a second time.” —Elie Wiesel, Holocaust Survivor and author of Night, 1960
Wahoo Public Schools is pleased to once again work in cooperation with the Institute for Holocaust Education (Omaha) and Educational Service Unit 2 (Fremont) to host Holocaust survivor assemblies in recognition of this year's Week of Understanding.
On Tuesday, March 24 at 10am, Wahoo Middle and High School students, along with 6-12 students across Nebraska, will have the opportunity to personally meet and hear from Cyd Gottlieb. Though Cyd Gottlieb never personally met her Holocaust Survivor grandparents, as a child, she gained a deep understanding of their respective journeys through various ghettos, concentration camps, displaced persons camps, and countries from a box of documents kept on the top shelf of a closet. Inside, she found authentic primary documents of different paper types, fonts, chronological stamps, seals, and languages. By following patterns and details, she figured out how to understand what words could not describe.
In 2023, with this trove of information, Cyd completed 3GNY’s WEDU speaker training course to better learn how to distill her family narrative and contribute to public Holocaust education. Cyd is a second-time participant in our Week of Understanding.
At 1:30pm, our 2nd speaker Steven Goldberg will present. Steve Goldberg’s presentation is titled: My Friend Abe. Currently Steve is taking a break from his 20+ year career as a high school history teacher to share the story of Abe Piasek, a Holocaust survivor from Poland. Mr. Goldberg met Abe in November of 2018 when he came and spoke at the school he was teaching at in Durham, NE. The two became friends. Abe passed away in 2020 at the age of 91. Three days before he died, Abe asked Steve to “keep telling my story.” To date, Steve has shared Abe’s story over 150 times to close to 9,000.
Our guests will be speaking live from the Wahoo Public Schools Performance-Learning Center. WMS/WHS students, along with students from other schools in the region, will attend these assemblies on site, and students from schools across the state will connect live from remote sites, via the school's YouTube channel.
Wahoo High School students will attend the morning assembly, and Wahoo Middle School students will attend the afternoon presentation. Community members are openly invited to attend these events as well, either in person, or via the YouTube live-stream (link: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCfsAuQGa87easBGbGBy87vg).
ALL SCHOOLS that would like to participate in one or both of these events, on site or remotely, please click to register: REGISTRATION LINK
Now in its 16th year, this important IHE program began as an effort to bring first-hand Holocaust survivor and U.S. liberator testimony to schools across the metro, giving students the opportunity to hear this testimony while survivors and liberators are still here to tell their stories. For those survivors and liberators who are no longer with us, their families continue to keep their stories alive.
ESU 2 became involved with the Week of Understanding back in 2012, the program's second year. Since then, the geographic reach has expanded beyond metropolitan Nebraska schools to include not only live student audiences traveling to Wahoo, but also school audiences totaling thousands of students connected remotely from the rural east, central and panhandle regions of Nebraska.
IHE Executive Director Scott Littky also stressed the importance of keeping these voices in the spotlight, in hopes that such a tragic chapter of history is never repeated.
“As time takes us away from the Holocaust, it is even more critical to listen to the words of the witnesses,” commented Littky. “Their personal stories add a face and a name to a distant and somewhat incomprehensible event. Not all survivors can speak about their experiences. Some want only to remember their memories silently, but for some, there is a need to speak out. These individuals, and others like them, are the last to bear witness to the Holocaust. It has never been more important to listen to the words of this generation."
Again, all are invited to these sessions. If you represent a school, please register for these assemblies at the link above. If you are a community member (or if you have any questions), please register by contacting WPS Band Director Jason Smith at 402-443-4332, ext. 3302, or email jsmith@wahoowarriors.org.