Dr. David Machlis
Dr. David Machlis is an award-winning Economics Professor at Adelphi University, where he has taught since 1967. He was appointed by President Ronald Reagan to the Council on Bilingual Education in 1982 and has been a leading voice in innovative Holocaust education and an advocate for combating racism, hatred, and antisemitism.
He is Vice-Chairman of International March of the Living, an organization he has been involved with for over three decades. The March of the Living, founded in 1988, brings thousands of students, Holocaust survivors, educators and distinguished leaders worldwide to Auschwitz, to commemorate Holocaust Remembrance Day, where they march against prejudice, intolerance and hate.
Dr. Machlis has initiated many innovative Holocaust educational programs, including:
1994: Commissioners & Heads of State Boards of Education was the first organized group from outside the Jewish community in North America to participate in the March of the Living. The initiative recognized the need to broaden the audience for Holocaust education, reach more diverse populations, and make Holocaust education more accessible to all.
2001: March of Remembrance and Hope, an experiential program designed to teach university students of diverse backgrounds about the dangers of hate and bigotry through the study of the Holocaust and other genocides on a one-week visit to Germany and Poland.
2012: World War II Camp Liberators March of the Living Mission: American veterans who liberated the concentration camps during WWII, joined the March of the Living with Holocaust survivors and thousands of students, and were honored for their service.
2014 – United Nations Exhibit, “When You Listen to a Witness, You Become a Witness”: The exhibit featured powerfully moving images and reflections curated from 25 years of the March of the Living. It documented the stories of the aging survivors and the young students who, together, embark on this life-changing journey and return profoundly transformed.
2016 – Nuremberg Symposium: March of the Living, The Raoul Wallenberg Centre for Human Rights and Jagiellonian University presented an international legal symposium marking the 80th anniversary of the Nuremberg Race Laws and the 70th anniversary of the Nuremberg Trials.
2019 – Deans of Schools of Education & Law Schools: Educators and deans from across the US, instructing the next generation of teachers across America, joined the March of the Living to better equip them with the tools to teach the Holocaust.
2021 – Medicine & Morality: Lessons from the Holocaust and Covid-19: This academic symposium featured internationally known scholars discussing the nexus between medicine, ethics, and the Holocaust, and how lessons learned from the past have been incorporated into the response to the current pandemic. The program also included testimony from Holocaust survivors and stories of healthcare professionals whose lives were shaped by the Holocaust.
2023- Two Museums Program: This program brings black and Jewish students to Washington, DC, on a three-day trip to the US Holocaust Memorial Museum and the National Museum of African American History and Culture. The aim is to create a better understanding among students of diverse backgrounds and to motivate students to combat hatred and intolerance in society and on their college campuses.
2024 – University Presidents’ March of the Living Mission to Poland: University presidents from across North America joined the March of the Living to learn about the Holocaust by visiting historical sites and landmarks in Poland, and meeting with Holocaust survivors.
Event Production and Other Initiatives: Dr. Machlis has produced some well-known events at Auschwitz-Birkenau, including Oprah Winfrey’s historic visit and broadcast with Nobel laureate and Holocaust survivor, Elie Wiesel, and a large-scale Bar Mitzvah for 78-year-old Schindler’s List director, Branko Lustig, held outside bunk 24, where he was once incarcerated as a boy. The service was held during the March of the Living.
These missions and initiatives have something in common: studying the history of the Holocaust and exploring the roots of prejudice, intolerance and hatred.
Dr. Machlis has been the recipient of multiple awards and honours, including the Adelphi President’s Humanitarian Award (2020), the University’s Teaching Excellence Award (2018), and the Diversity in Business Award (2023).
Lee Maschler
Lee Maschler is a seasoned investor, entrepreneur, and founder at the intersection of capital markets, finance, technology, and strategic investing. He is the Founder and Owner of Trillium Trading, a premier proprietary trading firm specializing in U.S. equities. Since founding the firm in 2003, he has built Trillium into a leading platform known for its focus on technology, disciplined execution, and the development of high-performing traders.
In addition to Trillium, Maschler is the Founder and CEO of Lion Cave Capital, a quantitative high-frequency trading and research firm operating at the intersection of mathematics, technology, and market structure. He also founded Trillium Surveyor, a regulatory technology platform providing advanced trade surveillance and best execution analytics to financial institutions.
Maschler’s leadership extends beyond business into philanthropic engagement. In response to humanitarian crises, he and the Trillium organization have pledged substantial support to charitable efforts with commitments to aid humanitarian relief, including matching donations from traders and colleagues to raise more for organizations providing emergency services, medical care, and support to affected communities.
He is also personally involved in supporting international health and service initiatives. Maschler and his team have engaged with organizations like Save a Child’s Heart, hosting their leaders to highlight the impact of their work helping children worldwide access critical cardiac care, and publicly celebrating the mission of organizations that provide life-saving treatment regardless of background or geography.
Maschler emphasizes practical leadership, community support, and social responsibility, leveraging both capital and networks to advance causes that improve lives.
ELi Rubenstein OC
Eli Rubenstein, Officer of the Order of Canada (OC), is a Holocaust educator, writer, storyteller, and filmmaker. Since 1988, serves as the religious leader of Toronto’s Congregation Habonim, the first synagogue in Canada founded by Holocaust survivors. He served as National Director of March of the Living Canada from 1988 to 2024 and currently serves as Director of Education for International March of the Living. In 2001, he cofounded the March of Remembrance and Hope program, an international Holocaust education program for university and college students from diverse religious, cultural, and ethnic backgrounds. From 2008 to 2021, he served as President of the Canadian Friends of the Israel Guide Dog Center.
He received the Canadian Jewish Book Award for “For You Who Died I Must Live On” (1994), the Ve’ahavta Tikkun Olam Education Award (2008), the Miklos Kanitz Holocaust and Human Rights Education Award (2013), and was appointed to the Order of Canada in 2022.
Among his most notable works are the CBC film, “Blind Love: A Holocaust Journey to Poland with Man’s Best Friend” (2015), the book “Witness: Passing the Torch of Holocaust Memory to New Generations” (2020), and the i24 News documentary “Saving the World Entire: Rescuers During the Holocaust” (2023).
His most recent ongoing initiative, the March of the Living Archive Project (MOLDAP), was established in 2013 to gather the many years of precious Holocaust survivor testimony recorded during March of the Living trips since 1988.
The material has been digitized, logged, archived, and edited into mini documentaries, which are viewable online, on demand, to the public. The archive also features vignettes and full-length documentary films & interviews.
In 2018, MOLDAP partnered with the USC Shoah Foundation to film Holocaust survivors in the locations where their stories began, using cutting-edge technologies to record their stories. This growing archive is currently available in 360, IWalk, IWitness, Travelogue and Interactive mediums, viewable at https://molarchiveproject.com.
Joseph Celentano
Professor Joseph Celentano is a Senior Adjunct Faculty Member in the Management Department at Adelphi University’s Robert B. Willumstad School of Business. He teaches in the areas of management practice and organizational effectiveness, bringing a practical, student-centred approach to the classroom.
With a long-standing commitment to teaching excellence, Professor Celentano is known for his clear communication, engaging lectures, and supportive feedback style. Students consistently rate him as one of the most effective instructors in the business program, emphasizing innovation, authenticity and inclusive leadership. Through dynamic learning experiences and real‑world application, students develop the skills and perspectives needed to thrive in a rapidly changing world. He is also cited for his genuine investment in student success. His teaching blends academic theory with real‑world application to prepare students for leadership roles in a variety of organizational settings.
In addition to his teaching role, Professor Celentano contributes to the Adelphi community through mentorship and by fostering a learning environment grounded in professionalism, curiosity, and respect. His work reflects the mission of the Willumstad School of Business to develop thoughtful, capable, and ethical business leaders.
In March 2024, Professor Celentano was honored as a recipient of the Diversity in Business Award, presented by Long Island Business News. This award recognizes leaders who actively advance inclusion and belonging in their communities and workplaces. He credits his father, an Italian immigrant, as a major influence, noting that he taught him to stand up for those who could not stand up for themselves.
He also serves as Chair of the Council for Community Inclusion and Belonging (CCIB) at the Adelphi Willumstad School of Business, further demonstrating his leadership in shaping inclusive culture and policy.
Celentano’s dedication to helping others raise themselves up stems from his own humble beginnings. “I was raised in a family that had little formal education,” he said. “I grew up with the perception that college was not for people like me—it was something for other people.”
Despite that perception, Celentano loved school and continued on to college—the first in his family to do so. After earning an associate’s degree, he went to work for the United States Postal Service, where, over 37 years, he rose from entry-level clerk to regional manager. Celentano says it was during those years that he found a way to honor his father’s example through his own actions.
“I became the union shop steward,” he said, “and that was my opportunity to stand up for others.”
It was also an opportunity to continue his education. At the age of 32, while raising his family, Celentano went back to college part time and earned a bachelor’s degree in business at Empire State College, part of the SUNY system. Soon after, the postal service put him into a developmental program for future leaders, and that inspired him to go back to school again—this time to Adelphi’s MBA program. Two years later, he graduated, the only one in his cohort with a 4.0 academic average. One of his professors, recognizing Celentano’s talents, asked him if he would be interested in teaching at the college level, and in 2008 he got the call to join the Willumstad School faculty. He retired from the postal service and has spent the past 18 years helping students of all ages realize their potential.
Celentano’s hope for his legacy is as humble as his upbringing. “I had opportunities many other people haven’t had, and I decided I would like to pay it back,” he said. “I would like to be remembered as a good guy who did the right thing because he cared.”
Dr. R. Sentwali Bakari serves as an ambassador and advocate for Adelphi students. He earned his doctorate from the University of Northern Colorado and is also an alumnus of the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse. He has responsibility for health services, student involvement, student conduct, residential life, counselling and support services, student access, the Center for Career and Professional Development, the Interfaith and Multicultural Centers, as well as the Offices of Community Concerns and Resolution, Title IX and community inclusion and belonging initiatives.
He passionately promotes and fosters global and multicultural understanding among students—an appreciation he developed through numerous international experiences, including a Fulbright scholarship to the United Kingdom and a Dean of Students role with Semester at Sea, Institute for Shipboard Education.
Professor Steven T. Katz holds the Alvin J. and Shirley Slater Chair in Jewish Holocaust Studies at Boston University and is the former Director of the Elie Wiesel Center for Jewish Studies. He received his Ph.D. from the University of Cambridge [England] in 1972. Prior to coming to Boston, he taught at Dartmouth College and then Cornell University, where he chaired the Department of Near Eastern Studies. He is a member and former co-chair of the Academic Committee of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, Chair of the Holocaust Commission of the Memorial Foundation for Jewish Culture, and former Academic Advisor to the Chair (2011-2017) of the 38 countries that belong to the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA).
A prolific author, Steven Katz has published numerous works on the Holocaust and Jewish philosophy, including Post-Holocaust Dialogues: Studies in 20th Century Jewish Thought (NYU Press, 1983), which won the 1984 Jewish Book Award in Jewish thought; Historicism, the Holocaust, and Zionism: Critical Studies in Modern Jewish Thought and History (NYU, 1993); and The Holocaust in Historical Context, vol. 1 (1994), which was selected as the “Outstanding book of 1994 in the category of philosophy and religion” by the American Association of Publishers. Further volumes include The Impact of the Holocaust on Jewish Theology (2005); Wrestling with God: Jewish Theological Responses During and After the Holocaust (2007), and five important books on comparative mysticism, all published by Oxford University Press, which highlight his theory of the contextual analysis of mystical experience. The most recent of these volumes is Comparative Mysticism: An Anthology of Original Sources (2013). He edited Volume IV of The Cambridge History of Judaism: The Late Roman-Rabbinic Period which won the 2007 US National Jewish Book Award in the reference category, and he founded and continues to edit the prize-winning journal Modern Judaism, now in its 35th year of publication.
Prof. Katz has published over 120 articles in the fields of Jewish Studies, Holocaust studies, philosophy of religion, and comparative mysticism, and has lectured at universities in Israel, Europe, and around the world, including Australia, India, China, and, recently, Iran. He was awarded the University of Tübingen’s Lucas Prize for Holocaust studies in 1999, Honorary Doctorates by Gratz College in 1987 and by the University of Warwick, UK, in July 2014, and, in 2014, a Distinguished Achievement Award for Holocaust Studies and Research by the Holocaust Education Foundation of Northwestern University. He is a Fellow of both the Academy of Jewish Philosophy and the American Academy of Jewish Research.
Colin White has a background in digital technologies, with a focus on media production, audio engineering, and music production. Colin worked with top-40 artists in the pop music industry in the early 2000’s, writing and recording artists’ vocals and instrumentals for major record labels. He received a gold record in 2012. Switching gears, he worked for Canada’s National Commission, producing Ottawa’s yearly festival, Winterlude, a 2-week-long music, arts and entertainment festival held on Ottawa’s frozen Rideau Canal.
He began his journey into Holocaust education in 2017, working with Eli Rubenstein, and has since been writing historical content, designing imagery, and editing various film projects. He was introduced to March of the Living through Rubenstein’s various initiatives and projects, and has aligned himself with principles that support acceptance, inclusion, and peaceful coexistence for humankind.
In 2023, he created his first online repository for Jewish content. In 2024, he created an archival biographical site for Dr. Benedykt Ziemilski. In 2025, he redesigned and took over updating the March of the Living Digital Archive Project (MOLDAP), which houses thousands of hours of MOTL Holocaust survivor footage and is made available to filmmakers and documentary producers. MOLDAP works in partnership with various organizations, including the USC Shoah Foundation and The Last Ones (TLO).
Colin created the Two Museums Program website and maintains, updates, and will upgrade it on an ongoing basis.
Presidential Advisory Board
Dr. Roslyn Clark Artis – Benedict College
Jenna M. Colvin J.D. – Georgia Independent College Association
Dr. Mark R, Ginsberg – Towson University
Elizabeth M. Puthoff, M.Ed – Independent Colleges and Universities of Texas
Dr. Lori S. White – Depauw University