The Nightingale Initiative of Global Health pays tribute to the daring and courage of Irena Sendler, one of the most remarkable heroes of World War II, who saved the lives of 2500 Jewish children, during the German occupation of Poland.

Irena Sendlerowa

On April 19, 2009, The Courageous Heart of Irena Sendler, a Hallmark Hall of Fame production written and directed by John Kent Harrison and starring Anna Paquin in the title role, was broadcast by CBS.

Irena Sendler (in Polish Irena Sendlerowa née Krzyżanowska; 15 February 1910 – 12 May 2008) was a Polish Catholic social worker a member of the Polish Underground and the Żegota resistance organization in German-occupied Warsaw during World War II.

As a social worker, Irena has access to the Warsaw ghetto, making it possible for her to rescue the daughter of a Jewish friend and safely hide the young girl with a Catholic family.

Irena recruited sympathetic friends and co-wokers to smuggle children out and place them is safe home, farms and convents. At enormous personal risk, she devised daring schemes to sneak the chidren past Nazi guards, bringing them out in ambulances, suitcases and even wheelbarrows.

Called "The Female Schindler", Sendler's story was brought to light in the United States when students in Kansas found it described in a magazine and popularized it through their play, Life in a Jar.