Board of Directors

Board Leadership

  • Andrzej Rojek has been active in global finance since 1986. Recently retired as the Managing Director at Advent Capital Management, he was a founder of Lydian Asset Management, a global hedge fund established in 1999 that focused on convertible bonds and relative value credit investments. Mr. Rojek served as a Managing Director and partner at Bankers Trust and with the convertible’s groups at Merrill Lynch.

    An American citizen who was born in Poland in 1956, Mr. Rojek graduated with honors from the University of Warsaw in 1979 with a degree in economics. He earned his master’s degree in economics from Columbia University in 1985. He serves presently as a trustee of the Kosciuszko Foundation in New York, as a member of the Executive Committee at Packer Collegiate Institute in New York, and on the investment committee of Mount Holyoke College. He is involved in numerous charitable initiatives in Poland, including POLIN Museum of History of Polish Jews, and the United States, where he supports the Chair in Polish Studies at Columbia University.

    In 2012, Mr. Rojek was decorated by the President of the Republic of Poland, Bronisław Komorowski, with the Knight’s Cross of the Order for Merit of the Republic of Poland for his work with the Jan Karski U.S. Centennial Campaign.

  • Roman Rewald is a Polish lawyer and US-qualified attorney admitted to practice law in the United States (State of Michigan). He is a retired partner of the law firm of Weil, Gotshal & Manges, continuing as an international commercial lawyer and experienced mediator holding an International Commercial Mediation Training Certificate. He is the President of the Lewiatan Mediation Center at the Employers’ Confederation Lewiatan in Poland and a mediator listed at the ICC ADR Paris. He is also an arbitrator at the Polish Chamber of Commerce Arbitration Court and Arbitration Court of Lewiatan Confederation, as well as an arbitrator at the Alternative Dispute Resolution Center of the American Chamber of Commerce in Kosovo. Roman is past Chair of the Board of Directors of the American Chamber of Commerce in Poland, Chair of the Foundation Board of Ronald McDonald Foundation in Poland (Fundacja Ronalda McDonalda), and sits on boards of commercial entities. In 2014, Roman Rewald was decorated with the Officer’s Cross of the Order of Rebirth of Poland Polonia Restituta, for contributions to the country’s economic transformation.

  • Elizabeth Szancer is an art curator and the founder of ESKart LLC, an art advisory firm that provides curatorial and collections management services to private collectors, corporations, and museums. She began her career at the Whitney Museum and as an Assistant Curator of the Nelson A. Rockefeller Collection. She has served various professional organizations, most notably the Association of Professional Art Advisors, where she currently is the Vice President, and on the Professional Fine Arts Committee of Foundation for Art and Preservation in Embassies. In 2011, Elizabeth curated the 10th anniversary exhibition of the Neue Galerie New York, "The Ronald S. Lauder Collection: Selections from the 3rd Century BC to the 20th Century. Germany, Austria, and France," and is curating the Neue Galerie’s 20th-anniversary exhibition. She participates in public programs and publications relating to the practices of art collecting and curating. Dedicated to the preservation of cultural Jewish heritage in Poland, she serves on the boards of American Friends of the JCC Krakow, Foundation of Jewish Heritage Poland, and the New Cracow Friendship Society. She is an active member of the Committee for the Preservation of Jewish Heritage in Tarnow, co-chair of the Antisemitism Task Force of the Stephen Wise Free Synagogue in New York City, and a member of the International Advisory Committee of Holocaust Survivor Day.

Board Of Directors

  • Patron of American Friends of POLIN Museum | Board Member

    Ambassador Ronald S. Lauder is an international philanthropist, businessman, ambassador, and art collector. He has served as President of the World Jewish Congress since 2007 and worked tirelessly to strengthen Jewish communities, preserve Jewish heritage, and combat antisemitism around the world.

    His relationship with POLIN Museum reaches back to the very beginnings of the museum project. During the early 1990s, Ambassador Lauder served as Co-Chair of the International Honorary Committee that was established to promote the idea of creating a museum dedicated to the history of Polish Jews. In 1996, the Ronald S. Lauder Foundation was the first major donor to the nascent institution. In recognition of this pioneering commitment, POLIN Museum has honored him as its First Donor.

    His support has continued throughout POLIN Museum’s development, helping to expand POLIN Museum’s collection and acquire important original objects for the Core Exhibition. He supported the position of Chief Curator of the Core Exhibition, which was held by Barbara Kirshenblatt-Gimblett, for six years. Since 2020, Ambassador Lauder has served as a member of the POLIN Museum Council.

    Ambassador Lauder has played a major role in the renewal of Jewish life in Central and Eastern Europe. The Ronald S. Lauder Foundation, established in 1987, was a great support to Jewish education and communities across the region, including Poland. He is also Chair of the Auschwitz-Birkenau Memorial Foundation. Earlier in his public career, Ambassador Lauder served as U.S. Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for European and NATO Affairs and as U.S. Ambassador to Austria.

    In recognition of his extraordinary and longstanding commitment to POLIN Museum and American Friends of POLIN Museum, Ronald S. Lauder holds the title of Patron of American Friends.

  • After two decades in executive marketing roles building successful companies, Hilda launched her own consulting practice in 1996. Recent work with nonprofits focused on board development, strategic planning, fundraising, and building alliances for The Vera Institute, Lord Cultural Resources, YIVO, The Gordon Parks Foundation, The Anti-Defamation League, and UJA-Federation of New York.

    Hilda’s media and technology career includes the introduction of the National Geographic Channel in the US and clients such as Viewer’s Choice, The Disney Channel and Viacom. She also co-established Foote Cone Belding Direct in NY and served as Director of New Business Development and Marketing at Viacom.

    Hilda has been a trustee for The Pearl Theatre, CECArtsLink and has served on executive committees for The Jewish Museum, the James Beard Foundation and The Arts and Business Council. She is a well-respected public speaker, facilitator, coach and writer.

    The daughter of Holocaust survivors, Hilda has been actively restoring the Jewish story in her ancestral city of Radom, Poland and has collaborated with the Forum for Dialogue in Warsaw.

  • Dr. Anita Friedman has a distinguished record of public service, as both a professional and volunteer leader. She is the President of the Board of the Koret Foundation. Her roles in the Jewish and general communities extend from the Bay Area to the national and international arenas. Professionally, Dr. Friedman heads Jewish Family and Children’s Services (JFCS) in the San Francisco Bay Area.

    Dr. Friedman is also an expert on Holocaust and genocide education. She is the editor of the English-language edition of Rywka’s Diary, which has also been published in Polish translation and in more than a dozen other languages. She is the publisher of the Holocaust memoir Against All Odds and the Executive Producer of a forthcoming film on Polish Jewish life, Love, Murder, and Miracles.

    As a policy consultant to the State of Israel Ministry of Social Affairs, she has advised on effective policy strategies for human service provision and immigrant absorption. She also serves as a trustee on the national boards of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, University of Southern California’s Shoah Foundation, and Taube Foundation for Jewish Life and Culture. She has served on various local, state, national, and international commissions, including as Commissioner of the San Francisco Human Services Commission. She has received numerous awards for her public service leadership.

  • Izabela Grocholski is an independent art advisor living in between New York and Warsaw.

    For fourteen years she was Vice President at Christie’s in the Classic Art Group, specializing in Russian Art. She has over two decades of experience in the art world.

    She worked with the preeminent Jan Krugier Gallery, New York for seven years. Having lived in Poland prior to that, she worked at the Zachȩta National Gallery of Art, under the directorship of Anda Rottenberg.

    Izabela had also assisted the curatorial team in the Drawings Department of the Museum of Modern Art, New York during her studies. She graduated from McGill University in 2000 with a degree in Art History and Political Science. Her former roles include working for the United Nations as a Media Liaison and was in charge of Marketing in the Unia & Polska Foundation in Warsaw, a driving force in Poland’s accession to the EU.

  • Shana Penn is the Executive Director of Taube Philanthropies and a visiting scholar at the Graduate Theological Union’s Center for Jewish Studies, in Berkeley. She earned her masters degree in European Studies at Jagiellonian University. A second edition of her award-winning book, Solidarity’s Secret: The Women Who Defeated Communism in Poland, was recently published in the United States and in Polish translation in 2014.

    Shana was decorated with the Commander’s Cross of the Order of Merit of the Polish Republic in 2013 for her outstanding contribution to the development of Polish-Jewish dialogue, support of POLIN Museum of the History of Polish Jews, advocacy on behalf of Poland’s inclusion in the Visa Waiver Program, and scholarly work on the role of women in Poland’s Solidarity movement. President Komorowski, when commemorating women on the 23rd anniversary of the first democratic elections in Poland on June 4, 1989, said he was inspired by Shana’s ground-breaking research.

    Most recently, in 2021, Shana received the Medal of Gratitude from the European Solidarity Centre in Gdańsk for being the first to research and present the role of women in the Solidarity movement and in introducing democracy in Poland.

  • Irene Kronhill Pletka was born in Shanghai. Thanks to a Sugihara visa, her parents, Jakob and Lilka Kronzylberg, both Polish citizens, were able to flee Vilna in January 1941 and cross Russia to Japan and then Shanghai. The family moved to Melbourne, Australia in 1946. Educated in Melbourne, she later studied and lived in London and Boston, earning degrees in psychology and fine arts. She settled in Manhattan in the 1990s.

    She is committed to the vitality of secular Jewish culture and the Yiddish language. She founded and is Director of The Kronhill Pletka Foundation, which is dedicated to the memory of her parents. The foundation supports Jewish cultural, educational, and social justice projects around the world. She is a member of the Board of Directors of the YIVO Institute for Jewish Research and Center for Jewish History and a supporter of the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee, which helped her family and so many others during our darkest hours. She is a Distinguished Benefactor of POLIN Museum of the History of Polish Jews, where the reconstruction of timber-frame roof, painted ceiling, and bimah of the Gwoździec wooden synagogue were made possible by her generosity and that of her foundation.

  • Born and raised in Poland, Tomasz came to the United States in 1977. He earned a master’s degree from the Central School of Planning and Statistics in Warsaw and began his career in computer consulting in diverse fields of  banking, insurance, healthcare, and international trade. In 1983, he founded ADEPT, Inc., an information technology consulting and services company. Under his leadership, ADEPT grew into an international business with offices across the United States and in Mexico and annual revenues exceeding $60 million. The company was sold in 2001 to TMP Worldwide, the parent company of Monster.com.

    Throughout his career and retirement, Tomasz has been active in civic and charitable organizations. He served on the Board of Trustees of New England Medical Center Hospital and has supported and volunteered with organizations working in healthcare, humanitarian relief, education, conservation, and community service. He has also mentored business leaders and advised early-stage companies.

    A lifelong student of history, literature, and international affairs, Tomasz is fluent in Polish, English, French, Russian, and Spanish. His interests reflect a deep commitment to preserving history, strengthening ties between Poland and the United States, and promoting understanding among people of different cultures and backgrounds.

  • Jerzy Warman is a son of survivors of the Warsaw ghetto. His mother was a courier for the Jewish Fighting Organization (Żydowska Organizacja Bojowa ŻOB), and both of his parents fought with the ŻOB unit during the Warsaw Uprising of 1944. Jerzy grew up in Warsaw, where he studied law and sociology. He left Poland in the wake of the antisemitic campaign in 1968 and completed his graduate studies at Yale University and Columbia University. During the 1980s, he served as President of The International Network of Children of Holocaust Survivors and was a member of the Committee in Support of Solidarity in New York, which later became the Institute for Democracy in Eastern Europe. He has served on the editorial board of Uncaptive Minds, a periodical published by IDEE, and is a labor policy analyst with the City of New York.

Executive Leadership

  • Barbara Kirshenblatt-Gimblett is Professor Emerita at New York University and Ronald S. Lauder Chief Curator of the Core Exhibition at POLIN Museum of the History of Polish Jews, in Warsaw. Her books include Image before My Eyes: A Photographic History of Jewish Life in Poland, 1864–1939 (with Lucjan Dobroszycki); They Called Me Mayer July: Painted and Memories of a Jewish Childhood in Poland Before the Holocaust (with Mayer Kirshenblatt); and Anne Frank Unbound: Media, Imagination, Memory, (with Jeffrey Shandler).

    Professor Kirshenblatt-Gimblett was awarded the 2021 Lifetime Achievement Award from the American Folklore Society. She was also honored for lifetime achievement by the Foundation for Jewish Culture, received honorary doctorates from the Jewish Theological Seminary of America, University of Haifa, and Indiana University, the 2015 Marshall Sklare Award for her contribution to the social scientific study of Jewry, and was decorated with the Officer’s Cross of the Order of Merit of the Republic of Poland. She was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and awarded the Dan David Prize. She serves on Advisory Boards for the YIVO Institute for Jewish Research, Council of American Jewish Museums, Jewish Museum Vienna, Jewish Museum Berlin, and the Jewish Museum and Tolerance Center in Moscow. She also advises on museum and exhibition projects in Lithuania, Belarus, Albania, Israel, New Zealand, and the United States.

Founders

  • An American businessman, Victor Markowicz is POLIN Museum’s first Distinguished Benefactor, co-founder of the North American Council of the Museum of the History of Polish Jews, precursor to the American Friends of POLIN Museum, and member of the POLIN Museum Council since 2008. Victorwas born in 1944 near Lake Baikal ,where his parents were interned in Stalinist labor camps. After the war, he returned to Poland with his family and studied mathematics at the University of Warsaw and at the Technion, Israel Institute of Technology, in Haifa, after departing for Israel in 1964. He created the software for ELBIT-100, Israel’s first commercial computer. In 1970, he immigrated to the United States, where he designed the first American state lottery in New Jersey. Co-founder of GTECH Corporation, a company that designs lottery systems for most state lotteries in the United States and 40 other countries on five continents. He has also owned race horses and produced films. He currently lives in New York and Florida with his wife ,Monika, and is an active investor. A bridge champion, he has captured several medals at the world bridge championships as a member of the Polish Seniors team. He has been honored with the Ellis Island Medal of Honor, awarded to immigrants who have made an outstanding contribution to America, and with the Commander’s Cross of the Order of the Republic of Poland

  • Founding Benefactor of POLIN Museum, Co-Founder and longtime Co-Chair of American Friends of POLIN Museum

    Sigmund Rolat (1930–2024) was one of the earliest and most important benefactors of POLIN Museum, a longtime member of the POLIN Museum Council, and a driving force in building its community of support in the United States.

    Love for Poland

    Born in Częstochowa, Poland, Sigmund survived the Holocaust, but lost his mother and older brother. After the war, in 1948, he came to the United States, where he continued his education and built a successful international business career. Yet Poland—and particularly the history and heritage of Polish Jews—remained central to his life.

    Sigmund became a philanthropist, cultural patron, and tireless advocate for Polish- Jewish dialogue and reconciliation. He supported many cultural and Jewish heritage initiatives in Poland, including the Singer Jewish Culture Festival in Warsaw and the Jewish Culture Festival in Kraków. He maintained an especially close relationship with his hometown of Częstochowa. He served as President of the World Society of Częstochowa Jews and Their Descendants and supported the city Philharmonic. In recognition of his contributions, he was named Honorary Citizen of Częstochowa. He also supported many cultural institutions in the United States, among them as a long-term patron of the Kosciuszko Foundation. POLIN Museum held a central place in his commitment to Polish-Jewish dialogue and to the preservation of this shared heritage, Sigmunt Rolat received numerous honors, including the Commander & Cross with Star of the Order of Merit of the Republic of Poland.

    Building American Friends

    Sigmund was a founder and longtime Co-Chair of the North American Council of the Museum of the History of Polish Jews, today’s American Friends of POLIN Museum.

    During the organization’s formative years, he provided not only leadership and philanthropic support, but also much of the practical infrastructure and staffing that allowed it to operate and grow. He helped cover operating expenses, hosted meetings and fundraising events, opened his own network to POLIN Museum, and even provided space for the organization’s office in his New York headquarters. His commitment and passion helped build the community of donors, advocates, and friends that supports American Friends of POLIN Museum today. His legacy lives on in POLIN Museum and in the organization and philanthropic community sustaining its mission in North America today.

    Sigmund, you were a true visionary who helped transform what was dream into a reality, POLIN Museum, for which you will be always loved and remembered.

  • Founding Benefactor of POLIN Museum

    Tad Taube was an American businessman and philanthropist from the San Francisco Bay Area. Born in Kraków, Poland, he immigrated with his parents to the United States in the spring of 1939, just months before the outbreak of World War II. He was the founder and chairman of Taube Philanthropies, co-founder and longtime president of the Koret Foundation, and founder and chairman of Woodmont Companies, a diversified real estate investment and management organization.

    Philanthropy was his passion, and Taube Philanthropies provided decades of leadership and support to significant educational, cultural, and civic nonprofit organizations, particularly in the San Francisco Bay Area, Israel, and Poland.

    Tad Taube was one of the three Founding Benefactors of POLIN Museum. His foundations represented the largest philanthropic commitment to POLIN Museum, and he became one of POLIN Museum’s most important philanthropic advocates.

    Drawing on his leadership and relationships within the Bay Area’s Jewish and philanthropic communities, he helped bring other major donors and foundations to POLIN Museum and mobilized substantial American private support for its creation and development. His ability not only to give, but also to inspire others to give, made him instrumental in building the philanthropic community around POLIN Museum in North America.

    Tad Taube also played an extraordinary role in the renewal of Jewish life and culture in Poland. Through Taube Philanthropies, he supported Jewish communities and institutions across the country, including the Jewish Culture Festival in Kraków, Jewish Studies in Wrocław, and the Jewish Historical Institute, where his generosity supported the preservation and accessibility of the Ringelblum Archive.

    In 2004, the President of the Republic of Poland awarded him the Commander’s Cross of the Order of Merit of the Republic of Poland, and in 2007 he was appointed Honorary Consul of the Republic of Poland in the San Francisco Bay Area. In June 2015, President Bronisław Komorowski awarded him the Commander’s Cross with Star of the Order of Merit of the Republic of Poland, one of Poland’s highest state distinctions for a foreign civilian.

    Tad Taube’s commitment to POLIN extended beyond his lifetime. In 2017, he became the first donor to POLIN Museum’s endowment campaign, establishing the Taube Legacy Endowment through a $3 million bequest. The gift supported the Taube Family Global Education Outreach Program and the Taube Family Mayer Kirshenblatt Art Collection, helping secure the Museum’s academic, educational, and cultural work for future generations. In this way, Tad became the first of POLIN Museum’s Distinguished Benefactors to make a major legacy commitment to the Museum’s future.

    Tad Taube’s wife Dianne, now Chairman and CEO of Taube Philanthropies, and his family carry on his legacy in Poland. Dianne Taube serves on the POLIN Museum Council and Donors Council and is Honorary Consul of the Republic of Poland in the San Francisco Bay Area. Tad continues to be represented on the American Friends Board by Shana Penn, Executive Director of Taube Philanthropies. He was a powerful advocate for POLIN Museum in the United States, expanding POLIN Museum’s visibility and philanthropic support, particularly on the West Coast. We are proud to honor Tad Taube and to recognize his extraordinary contribution to POLIN Museum and its community of supporters in North America.

Past Leadership of the North American Council

  • Stephen D. Solender played an instrumental role in establishing early North American support for what would become POLIN Museum of the History of Polish Jews. One of the most experienced leaders in American Jewish communal life, he brought to the emerging museum project decades of expertise in philanthropy, organizational development, and Jewish community leadership at a moment when the museum was still a vision seeking international recognition and private support.

    Solender had already built a distinguished career in Jewish communal service. For thirteen years, from 1986 to 1999, he had served as Executive Vice President of UJA-Federation of New York, one of the largest Jewish philanthropic organizations in the United States. He became the first President and CEO of United Jewish Communities, today the Jewish Federations of North America. After September 11, 2001, he also served as Executive Vice President of the 9/11 United Services Group, helping coordinate the distribution of hundreds of millions of dollars in charitable assistance following the attacks. 

    By 2003, he was serving alongside Victor Markowicz and Sigmund A. Rolat in the leadership of the emerging North American Council, working to raise awareness of the museum among American Jewish, philanthropic, political, and cultural leaders — years before POLIN Museum opened its doors. In June 2004, Solender led a delegation of American supporters of the museum in a meeting with President Aleksander Kwaśniewski at the Presidential Palace in Warsaw. His role subsequently expanded, and he went on to serve as President and CEO of the North American Council.

    Solender used his extensive relationships within American Jewish philanthropy to help introduce the museum to potential donors, foundations, communal leaders, and public figures. At a time when raising funds for a museum of Polish Jewish history was far from an obvious proposition in the United States, he became one of its most visible advocates. He used to say that future generations needed to understand not only how Jews died in Poland, but how they had lived there for nearly a millennium and how profoundly Polish Jews had shaped Jewish life and culture around the world. 

    This advocacy was particularly important in the formative years of the project. In 2006, the North American Council became a major platform for fundraising and public engagement in the United States and building a community of Jewish-American and Polish-American supporters on both coasts. Solender also helped build the early organizational infrastructure from which the North American Council and eventually American Friends of POLIN Museum would develop.

    Solender and his wife, Elsa Solender, also supported the Museum personally, joining the international community whose generosity made the museum and its Core Exhibition possible. 

    American Friends is proud to recognize Stephen D. Solender for his early leadership of the North American Council and for the crucial role he played in establishing the museum’s presence and philanthropic support in the United States. His work helped create the foundation upon which a lasting North American community of supporters could develop.

Emeritus / Emerita Directors

  • Samantha Rolat Asulin is the daughter of Sigmund A. Rolat, Holocaust survivor and philanthropist, who was one of the three founding benefactors of POLIN Museum and dedicated supporter of the institution in the decades that followed. Born and raised in the United States, Samantha developed a close connection to Poland and to Częstochowa, her father’s hometown. She traveled to Poland with him from a young age, later bringing her own family to experience and understand the world of her father.

    Reflecting on her family heritage, Samantha wrote: “It is always interesting to ask people from the United States where they are from. You will always get a unique answer. If you ask my children where they are from, they will tell you: Poland, England, and Israel. But they will also definitely tell you that they are Americans. Most people that I know have a strong sense of national identity. The beauty of my country is that we can feel American while also embracing our family’s religious and cultural traditions.” (https://czestochowajews.org/wp-content/uploads/samantha_eng.pdf)

    Over the years, Samantha supported her father in many of his philanthropic, cultural, and commemorative initiatives in Poland. Samantha and her husband, Dr. Yitzhack Asulin, were also donors to POLIN Museum’s Capital Campaign.

    Samantha served for many years on the Board of American Friends of POLIN Museum, sharing her father’s commitment to transmitting the legacy of Polish Jews to future generations. American Friends is deeply grateful to Samanta for her longstanding service and is pleased to recognize her as Director Emerita.

  • Michael Berkowicz is a Holocaust survivor, artist, and designer. His lifetime commitment to Jewish culture, Polish-Jewish dialogue, and POLIN Museum have combined philanthropy, leadership, and creative vision.

    Born in Siberia during World War II, Michael grew up in postwar Poland and experienced first-hand the revival of Jewish cultural life after the Holocaust. In Wrocław, he attended the Sholom Aleichem school, which offered courses in Yiddish, Jewish history, and secular subjects. After coming to the United States, Michael earned a degree in physics from City University of New York. He subsequently pursued a career in art and design.

    Together with his wife and longtime creative partner, Bonnie Srolovitz, Michael developed an extensive body of work in synagogue design, Judaica, liturgical furnishings, and memorial art. An important leader in the field of Jewish and religious art, Michael was a founding leader and early president of the American Guild of Judaic Art, chaired the Interfaith Forum on Religion, Art and Architecture of the American Institute of Architects, and later served as president of Faith & Form.

    His relationship with Poland remained deeply personal, and he returned to Poland many times. Michael became a founding member of Friends of the Krakow Jewish Culture Festival. He was one the earliest and most active leaders of the North American Council of the Museum of the History of Polish Jews, serving as Treasurer for many years. He worked closely with Sigmund Rolat and Victor Markowicz to build the organization, cultivate support in the United States, and advance the Capital Campaign for POLIN Museum – Michael and Bonnie were themselves supporters of the Campaign. He continued to serve on the North American Council Board until 2016.

    Michael’s unique contribution to the Museum’s Core Exhibition was introducing Barbara Kirshenblatt-Gimblett to Rick and Laura Brown, founders of Handshouse Studio, in 2007. That introduction became the starting point for the extraordinary project to reconstruct the roof and painted ceiling of the eighteenth-century wooden synagogue of Gwoździec, today one of the most iconic and beloved moments in POLIN Museum’s Core Exhibition.

    American Friends is deeply grateful for the many years Michael devoted to POLIN Museum and is proud to recognize him as Director Emeritus.

  • David Goldman is an attorney, philanthropist, and founder and Chairman of Fellowships at Auschwitz for the Study of Professional Ethics (FASPE), a nonprofit organization that promotes ethical leadership within the professions. FASPE’s supports emerging leaders in fields including law, medicine, business, journalism, clergy, and technology to study professional ethics, responsibility and leadership against the backdrop of the actions and choices of their professional counterparts in Nazi Germany.

    David, now retired, was a partner in the law firm of McDermott Will & Emery LLP. He served as the head of the firm’s International Corporate Advisory Practice Group until 2016 and as head of the firm’s New York office until 2017. David was recognized by The Legal 500 as a leader in his field and was named Dealmaker of the Year by The American Lawyer in 2011. David is currently a partner in Rosemark Capital Group, an investment firm focusing on investments and operations in the field of digital marketing.

    David has served on the board of several non-profit organizations, among them as chair of the Auschwitz Jewish Center and as secretary of the Board of American Friends of POLIN Museum until March 2023, an important period in the organization’s development. David and his wife, Debbie Bisno, have also supported POLIN Museum directly, most recently with a gift for the exhibition and book commemorating the antisemitic campaign of March 1968 and its aftermath.

    In gratitude for David’s years of service to American Friends of POLIN Museum, we are pleased to recognize him as Director Emeritus.

  • Cantor Joseph Malovany was born in Tel Aviv in 1941. A tenor soloist, he served as a cantor in Tel Aviv, the Israeli army, and synagogues in Johannesburg, and London before becoming cantor of the Fifth Avenue Synagogue in New York in 1973. He is Distinguished Professor of Liturgical Music at Yeshiva University, where the Joseph Malovany Chair for Advanced Studies in Jewish Liturgical Music was established in 1997 at the Belz School of Jewish Music. He is Rector at the Institute of Traditional Liturgical Music, Leipzig, Honorary President of the Cantorial Council of America, former Chair of the American Society for Jewish Music, and founder and Dean of the American Joint Distribution Committee’s Moscow Academy of Jewish Music. Cantor Malovany has been named Honorary Chief Cantor of Vilnius, Lithuania, and Honorary Chief Cantor of Riga, Latvia. In January 2004, he was decorated with the Cross of Merit – Commander of the Legion of Honor by the President of the Republic of Poland for his musical contributions. He is the first cantor to receive this honor.

  • Sylvia Safer is a prominent Jewish community leader, philanthropist, and supporter of POLIN Museum. She served as Vice President and later President of the Jewish Federation of North Jersey and has supported and served numerous organizations dedicated to Jewish life, history, education, and social responsibility. Sylvia currently serves on the Board of Directors of FASPE — Fellowships at Auschwitz for the Study of Professional Ethics and on the Advisory Board of the World Society of Częstochowa Jews and Their Descendants.

    Sylvia became involved with POLIN Museum even before it opened. Together with her family, she contributed to POLIN Museum’s Capital Campaign. She also joined the Board of the North American Council (former name of American Friends of POLIN Museum), which played a crucial early role in building awareness and philanthropic support in the United States, and she continued to serve as a member of the Board of American Friends of POLIN Museum until 2022.

    American Friends is deeply grateful for Sylvia Safer’s longstanding generosity, leadership, and commitment to POLIN Museum, and is pleased to recognize her as Director Emerita.

  • Stuart Schear has served in national and global leadership roles in communications, marketing and grantmaking for some of the most highly regarded foundations and non-profits, including American Jewish World Service, the Atlantic Philanthropies, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and Planned Parenthood Federation of America.

    Early in his career, Schear worked as a reporter for the MacNeil/Lehrer NewsHour and in various capacities on documentary films, including the PBS series Heritage: Civilization and the Jews and the Struggles for Poland. For the latter, he researched A Different World: Poland’s Jews 1919-1943.

    Schear has long had a strong interest in the history and culture of the Jews of Poland and Eastern Europe. As an undergraduate, he studied Yiddish language and literature and Jewish history at Columbia University and the YIVO Institute. More recently, Schear served on the board of the YIVO Institute and has traveled to Poland several times to pursue his own research.

    Currently, Schear is writing Pastry and Politics, a family history tracing the Yiddish roots of his New York family with generations of bakers and progressive political activists.

    Schear earned a B.A. from Oberlin College and received an M.A. from Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism, which honored him in 2022 with its annual alumni award.

  • Rabbi Arthur Schneier was born in 1930 in Vienna and survived the Holocaust in Hungary. He is Senior Rabbi of New York’s Park East Synagogue since 1962 and founder and President of the Appeal of Conscience Foundation since 1965. Rabbi Schneier is internationally known for his leadership on behalf of religious freedom, human rights, and tolerance. He was awarded the Presidential Citizens Medal for “his service as an international envoy for four administrations” and “as a Holocaust survivor, devoting a lifetime to overcoming forces of hatred and intolerance.” He received the U.S. Department of State Special Recognition Award for “his ecumenical work in favor of mutual understanding, tolerance, and peace.”

    Rabbi Schneier is the recipient of eleven honorary doctorates from American and European universities. In recognition of his achievements, his alma mater, Yeshiva University, established the Rabbi Arthur Schneier Center for International Affairs in 2004. He is Vice President of the World Jewish Congress, Honorary Chair of the World Jewish Congress (America), and a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, United Nations Development Corporation, United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, Committee on Conscience, Conference of Presidents of Major Jewish Organizations, and the American Joint Distribution Committee. In 2015 , Pope Francis designated him a Knight of St. Sylvestor, the fifth-highest papal order.

Team

Rebecca Schaeffer-Moldovan