The Claire Friedlander Family Foundation was pleased to provide a $20,000 grant that funded $5,000 scholarships to the essay winners in the 12th Annual Claire Friedlander Family Foundation Upstander Award competition held on Monday 16, 2022 at Westbury Manor. The foundation, in partnership with the Holocaust Memorial and Tolerance Center of Nassau County in Glen Cove (HMTC) annually honor middle school and high school students on Long Island who confront intolerance, prejudice or other forms of social injustice. Each of the award winners has demonstrated through their daily choices how they are Upstanders.
Due to the rise of hate speech, hate crimes, and bullying on Long Island and nationally, those who make a difference in their schools and communities by acting as Upstanders are more important than ever. HMTC defines an Upstander as a person who stands up for others and does not allow bigotry, hatred, or intolerance to happen without intercession. The student’s action could be one of intervention or prevention, big or small.
“The Claire Friedlander Family Foundation, in partnership with the Holocaust Memorial & Tolerance Center of Nassau County, is proud to acknowledge and award four remarkable Long Island students with the 2022 Upstander Awards,” said the foundation’s president and treasurer, Peter J. Klein. “Claire Friedlander was a Holocaust survivor who with her parents was saved by a righteous family. I know Claire would be incredibly proud of these student role models in our community who are leading by example.”
Those who applied needed to be enrolled in a Middle School or High School on Long Island needed a brief nomination letter from a teacher, guidance counselor, or have another adult who is not a family member and wrote a five-hundred-word essay on what actions they have taken that make them Upstanders.
For more information visit https://www.hmtcli.org/
L-R: Irene Klein of the Claire Friedlander Family Foundation, Sean Lobo of Saxton Middle School, Emma Kelly of Oyster Bay High School, Gianna Cook of John Glenn High School, Lauren Zweback of Plainview-Old Bethpage Middle School, Peter Klein of the Claire Friedlander Family Foundation and board member of the Holocaust Memorial and Tolerance Center of Nassau County.