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Survivors Week #7 – June 2023
June 15, 2023 - June 26, 2023
Since 2013, the Spungen Family Foundation has given scholarships to graduating seniors from Billings West High School in Montana to go on a trip to Poland, including a visit to Auschwitz, with the CANDLES Holocaust Museum (based in Terre Haute, Indiana).
Starting in the spring of 2017, Billings students unable to go to Poland used their spring break time to come to Illinois for an in-depth “Survivors Week.” In the past, the students and their teacher, Rob Stanton, have visited Baha’i Temple, Illinois Holocaust Museum, and CANDLES.
When in Lincolnshire for lunches/dinners, Holocaust and other Genocide related speakers will tell their personal stories. The Spungens’ have also hosted students from Carmel Catholic High School, docents from the Illinois Holocaust Museum, and other special guests.
This year was a little different. In 2023 we continued the Survivors Week annual tradition with another Montana school: Custer County District High School in Miles City, Montana. Teacher John Tooke brought nine students and three fellow teachers to the Chicago area for a mini Survivors Week. They spent two days at the Spungen household, hearing Agnes Schwartz and Ida Kersz speak, and visiting the Illinois Holocaust Museum.
Then they embarked on the trip to Poland with CANDLES before returning home to Montana.