After applying to the Survivors of the Shoah Foundation, potential interviewers attend a three-day group training. Bay Area volunteers are trained in Los Angeles and pay for their own travel and accommodations. For nearly 10 hours each day, they attend lectures by historians. They watch and critique videos of testimony, and practice interviewing survivors. It's with them day and night.
Testimonies run about two hours, and are conducted in survivors' homes.
Interviewers lead survivors from the period before the war, through the war and after it. Survivors' family members are encouraged to speak as well. Photographs and other memorabilia are also videotaped. Counseling is offered before and after the interview. They weren't ready.