Service Learning Project Propels Career for Alumna

February 5, 2024

Cameron Voss ’20, an anthropology and religious studies major, chose Albion in order to participate in the Holocaust Studies Service-Learning Project (HSSLP), which for her was a “life changing” week of service restoring a Jewish cemetery in Poland.

That experience led to a semester in Rwanda, where she interviewed genocide survivors, perpetrators, and returnees for her Honors thesis about the historical remembrance within families.

Her impressive experiences didn’t exactly qualify her to become a museum data specialist, but they played a large part in helping her get that job.

“When I applied at the Zekelman Holocaust Center, I didn’t have all the formal training they wanted, but they were interested in what Albion had done for me,” said Voss. “Working with any small nonprofit is being able to pivot to whatever needs to be done and with my Albion background, I think they knew I could do that.”

Voss was originally hired by the Zekelman Holocaust Center to assist with donor and visitor data management (a job she still does), but in late 2023, she proposed a new job for herself. “We just started gathering feedback from visitors, where they shared ideas about how to combat anti-Semitism and racial hatred,” she said. “I told my boss I could convert these responses into data that we could use to plan new exhibits and show the impact we have on visitors. As a data analyst, I’m the first person to see the trends that are emerging. What I do now is a combination of what I did in my major and for my thesis at Albion. I love it.”

Albion’s next HSSLP trip to Poland will be in May 2024, immediately following spring commencement. The trip includes five days of service in a Jewish cemetery in Wrocław, followed by exploration of Kraków and a day trip to Auschwitz-Birkenau, and other historically and culturally important Jewish sites. The group will also visit Oskar Schindler’s former factory at 4 Lipowa Street, where in 2001, Albion College students dedicated a large historical plaque which adorns the building.