Dr. Abby Kratz, director of THe Ackerman Center for Holocaust Studies

Dr. Abby Kratz is the new director of The Ackerman Center for Holocaust Studies.  She is also an associate provost.

Executive Vice President and Provost Hobson Wildenthal has announced the appointment of Dr. Abby Kratz to succeed Dr. Debra Pfister as director of The Ackerman Center for Holocaust Studies.

“The expanding profile of activities underway in our Ackerman Center, and the increased workload of administering these programs, have grown to the point that Dr. Pfister recommended to me that the staff be augmented by the addition of a new director, so that she would be able to devote all of her attention and energy to her primary priorities of teaching, outreach and curriculum development.

“Finding a replacement for Debbie and her exceptional talents to lead this vitally important program seemed a daunting challenge.  But, necessity stimulating creativity, I soon realized that a colleague of uniquely appropriate talents and experience was working at the associate provost’s desk a few steps away from my own in our office suite.  Dr. Abby Kratz has served the office of the provost in a variety of important roles since I convinced her to join our team soon after I arrived at UT Dallas.  My only challenge now was to convince her to move into this new, quite different, more independent, leadership role.  I knew that I had a major advantage in this task, because Abby has been for many years a major informal supporter of and collaborator with our Holocaust Studies Program.  And, to my gratitude and to the huge benefit of our program, she agreed to take up this new challenge.”

Timothy Snyder - Bloodlands: Europe Between Hitler and Stalin Bloodlands - Europe Between Hitler and Stalin book cover

Dr. Timothy Snyder's book Bloodlands has been translated into more than 20 languages.
 

Burton C. Einspruch
Holocaust Lecture Series

The Ackerman Center for Holocaust Studies at UT Dallas is hosting Professor Timothy Snyder of Yale University to present two lectures on Feb. 24 and 25 for the annual Burton C. Einspruch Holocaust Lecture Series.

The remaining lecture is Monday, Feb. 25, at 9 a.m., titled  “How Could the Holocaust Have Happened?”

The lecture will be held in the University’s Alexander Clark Center. For information, call (972) 883-2100 or email holocauststudies@utdallas.edu.

Dr. Kratz currently serves as associate provost at UT Dallas, and will retain this title in conjunction with the title of director of the Ackerman Center.

“I am honored to have been selected to assume this role in the Ackerman Center for Holocaust Studies and to have the opportunity to work together with the distinguished professors and talented students of the Center and join their ongoing endeavor to understand the past, so that we can change the future,” said Kratz.

Joining the University in 1978, she has served in variety of capacities, including appointments as associate director and interim director of UT Dallas libraries, and assistant vice president for business affairs. She also spent three years in South Texas as the director of the library at Texas A&M at Corpus Christi.  Prior to joining UT Dallas she managed and directed library programs at Harvard University, the Roxbury Latin School in Boston and The Ohio State University, where she served as the first women’s studies librarian in an American University

As a leader in the DFW community, Kratz has been a member of the Richardson Arts Commission since 2006 and was appointed chair in 2009. She currently is a member of the board of the Friends of the Dallas Public Library. She led the development and production of a DVD oral history archive for the City of Richardson in conjunction with the 20th anniversary of Leadership Richardson. She is an alumna of the Leadership Arts Institute of the Business Council for the Arts, and of Leadership Texas.  She received a master’s degree in education from Harvard University and a doctorate in educational leadership from  Texas A&M at Corpus Christi.