Heidenheim DP camp was located in the Stuttgart district of the US occupational zone.  Until its closure in the summer of 1949, the camp had on average over 2,000 inhabitants, a vast majority of whom wanted to emigrate to Palestine. The DPs were living in requisitioned private houses. The camp had an extensive religious life with a number of religious schools including the Talmud Torah, a Yeshiva and a rabbinical school. There was also a large kosher kitchen.

The ORT school in Heidenheim was established on 1 October 1946. A year later, in November 1947, the school  already had 190 students. They took courses in watch repair, jewellery and goldsmiths training, radio-mechanics, joinery, auto-mechanics, weaving, dress making, underwear garment making and locksmiths training. The school had close ties with local firms and many of the graduates worked as apprentices in the local businesses. The director of the school was Perez Hersz.

There was also a fachmittelschule operating in the camp, where pupils aged between fifteen and seventeen attended regular, general education classes for twenty-two hours a week and spent additional twenty hours in vocational training.