This week the Dallas Holocaust Museum received a $2 million grant from the Dallas-based W.W. Caruth, Jr. Foundation at Communities Foundation of Texas (CFT). Among the museum?s largest donations to date, funds will be used toward construction of the Dallas Holocaust and Human Rights Museum and expanded programming.
Dallas Holocaust Museum President & CEO Mary Pat Higgins calls the gift ?a message of hope to the farthest reaches of our nation and beyond.?
Half of the gift will go toward the construction of a new, state-of-the-art facility in the West End Historic District of Downtown Dallas. The 50,000-square-foot facility will house innovative exhibition spaces and a 250-seat Cinemark XD Theater to screen films and host the popular Upstander Speaker Series. Two high-tech classrooms for student-teacher workshops, a distance learning lab, an interactive research library, a climate-controlled archive housing the museum?s growing collection of artifacts, and a memorial room for reflection and discussion will be integrated into the new center. The other half of the gift will go toward educational programs, including the new Civil Discourse Series and the recently launched Law Enforcement and Society Training, which present thought-provoking respectful discussions.
?We view the robust educational mission and effective approaches taken by the Dallas Holocaust Museum for the benefit of our North Texas community as a transformational investment not only in a building but in crucial programming,? said Dave Scullin, President, and CEO of CFT.
The new Holocaust and Human Rights Museum will continue to highlight the lessons of the Holocaust while expanding its educational mission to consider all genocides and address a broader scope of human rights and the specific context in which Americans confront bigotry. The larger facility will allow the museum to reach more than 200,000 visitors a year, half of whom will be students. This past year, the museum served a record number of visitors, more than 83,000.
?We are extremely thankful to CFT and the Caruth Foundation for standing in solidarity with the mission of the museum?to combat prejudice, hatred, and indifference by educating and equipping every new generation with the knowledge and skills they need to be Upstanders instead of bystanders,? said Higgins.