Monday, April 15, 2019

Three UNCW students were awarded the Alfred and Anita Schnog Travel Award for Holocaust Studies for the 2018-19 academic year, giving each one the opportunity to travel internationally while pursuing separate research projects that delve into the lasting history of the Holocaust.
 
The awards provide $4,000 grants to conduct faculty-mentored research into the societal, cultural and geo-political forces that enabled the Holocaust to occur as well as its impact and legacy.
 
“The Alfred and Anita Schnog Travel Awards will be life-changing for these UNCW students,” said Lynn Wood Mollenauer, associate professor of history and chair of the history department. “They now have the opportunity to travel to places where they will learn firsthand how the history and memory of the Holocaust continues to impact politics, culture and society today.”
 
All three of the students who received travel awards plan to travel to Europe this summer for their research projects. Emma Cowen will spend several weeks in Lyon, France, investigating the French Resistance during World War II; Lynn Rawls will visit sites in Warsaw and Krakow to examine how the Nazi genocide is commemorated in Poland today and the controversy that has surrounded it; and Stephanie Taylor will be doing archival research on women forced into prostitution in the Nazi concentration camps of Westerbork, Ravensbruck and Auschwitz-Birkenau.
 
“I have been interested in the Holocaust since I was 10 years old,” Taylor said. “It has always been my dream to write about this event. As a graduate student, this grant means the world to me. I cannot thank the Schnog family enough for this opportunity.”
 
The Schnog Travel Award reflects UNCW’s mission as a university dedicated to the integration of teaching and mentoring with research and service. Cowen, Rawls and Taylor are committed to making the most of their time as students so they can leave UNCW equipped to better the world around them.
 
“When I found out I won the award, I can't tell you how much I cried,” Rawls said. “This whole experience has been an emotional one, considering what my topic will be covering as well as my own feelings toward winning this award.”
 
--Tyler Anne Whichard ’19
 
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