Taskforce Members

The California Taskforce on the Holocaust, Genocide, Human Rights, and Tolerance currently consists of the following members:

• Thomas Adams (ex officio member) is the Executive Director of the Curriculum Development and Supplemental Materials Commission and Director of the Curriculum Frameworks and Instructional Resources Division of the California Department of Education. He has a doctorate in Modern European history from the University of California, Davis. He also serves on the Content Review Panel for the California Standards Test for History-Social Science.
  
  
• Sam Goetz was born in Poland. At the age of 11 he came under German occupation. In 1942, at the age of 14, he and his family were deported to Belzec extermination camp. His parents, aunts, and uncles were murdered but he miraculously survived this deportation and spent the next 3 years in several Nazi concentration camps. He was liberated from Mauthausen/Ebensee concentration camp on May 6, 1945 by the American army when he was 16 years old. He spent the next 4 years in a displaced person's camp in Italy. After immigrating to the USA, he resumed his education, graduated from UCLA School of Public Health and earned his doctorate in Optometry from Southern School of Optometry.
  
  As a President of the 1939 Club, one of the largest survivor organizations in Southern California, he founded the UCLA Chair on Holocaust Studies and organized a preservation project in 1980 that videotaped the testimonies of Holocaust survivors. In 1987 he was appointed to the Content Committee of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. He has received numerous awards for humanitarian causes including the UCLA Alumni Association Community Service Award in 1989. In 1995, he was elected to serve as the Chair of the Martyr's Memorial Museum in Los Angeles. Presently he is serving as Holocaust Education Chairperson for the Anti-Defamation League, Southwestern Region, and Chairs the Holocaust Education Committee for the 1939 Club.
  
  
• Jona Goldrich was born in Lvov, Poland. He was smuggled out of Europe with one of his brothers in 1942, and sent to live in a refugee camp in pre-Israel Palestine. He served as a mechanical engineer in the Israeli Navy and the Merchant Marines, and participated in the military actions (1947 and 1948) that ensured the creation of the new State of Israel.
  
  Goldrich immigrated to the United States in 1953. He has been a partner at Goldrich and Kest Industries, a real estate development firm, since 1957. He has been a member of the California Holocaust Era Insurance Claims Oversight Committee since his appointment by Governor Davis in April 2000. He has been involved in aiding the Israeli educational institutions of Ben Gurion University, Bar-Ilan University, and Tel Aviv University. He has received many commendations, including the National Conference of Christians and Jews Humanitarian Award, the American Jewish Congress Civic Achievement Award, and the Ben Gurion University Award of the Israel Task Force of Israel Bonds. Mr Goldrich has served as a member of Guardians of Jewish Homes for the Aging, a leadership committee of the United Jewish Welfare Fund, and was President of the Western Region of American Friends of Tel Aviv University. In addition, Mr. Goldrich has been a member of the California Housing Council, the Governmental Affairs Council and the Los Angeles Police Crime Prevention Advisory Council.
  
  
• Beth Graybill (ex officio member) is the Director of Professional Services for the California Commission on Teacher Credentialing.  In her role as Director, Ms. Graybill oversees the development of standards for educator preparation programs and the development and ongoing administration of certification examination programs.  Prior to joining the Commission as a staff member in 2001, Ms. Graybill served as an ex-officio member of the Commission, representing the California Postsecondary Education Commission, where she served as a Senior Policy Analyst and worked on enrollment forecasting and analyzed the demand for new campuses. Ms. Graybill has a Master's degree in Public Policy and Administration from California State University, Sacramento.  Her professional interests include the assessment of teaching and learning, accreditation systems, teacher quality, and the purpose and function of postsecondary education.
  
  
• Marion Joseph (ex officio member, Fax (650) 321-8196), currently working as a special consultant to the State Board of Education, graduated with her B. A. in Political Science from UCLA. While on the California State Board of Education from 1997-2003, she undertook several major responsibilities including: development and adoption of California's academic content standards in English/language arts, mathematics, history-social science, science, and visual/performing arts; and adoption of comprehensive, standards-aligned instructional material for use in the California public schools. She volunteered service in Education Reform and Improvement from 1982-1997 and was a member of the Advisory Group to the Education Leaders Council in 2002. She was recognized as an Outstanding Woman by Governor Gray Davis who declared February 5 to be Marion Joseph Day in the State of California.
  
  
• Leon Kirakosian, an attorney with the law offices of Kirakosian and Associates in Glendale, is well-versed in the Armenian genocide of the early 20th century. He is a former instructor of government and history at Holy Martyrs Ferrahian Armenian High School and assistant professor at Glendale Community College. He is currently on the board of the Armenian National Committee America. He also serves on the board for the Foundation for Economic Development (FED) an agency focusing on improving trade relations between California and the former Soviet Republics.
  
  
• Ivy Lee earned a BA, MA and PhD in Sociology from UCLA. A professor of Sociology at CSU Sacramento, she is the founding President of the Chinese American Political Action Committee, Vice-President of the Historical Society to Preserve the Truth of the Sino-Japanese War, board member of the International Leadership Foundation, and immediate past president of the Global Alliance to Preserve the History of WWII in Asia. Professor Lee believes that, "educators can help our students to understand that the past, the present and the future are inextricably bound and that there is no going forward without first casting a backward glance." Her desire to join the Taskforce resulted from her years of noticing how little her students knew about WWII history, especially the history of the Asia-Pacific War. She says, "I would like to ensure our students learn not only about tolerance and genocides, and the Holocaust [but also] the massacres and massive human rights violations that took place around the same time in Asia."
  
  
• Maxine Morris has over 15 years of corporate finance experience both in large multinational companies (The Walt Disney Company, Sony Pictures Entertainment) and in small entreprenurial businesses. She received her Masters in Business Administration from the University of Southern California and her Bachelors of Business Administration from the University of Texas at Austin. Her skills focus on business and operational planning with an emphasis on budgeting and cost control. She currently works at the RAND Corporation in Santa Monica, California in Corporate Finance.
  
  Her other activities currently include serving on the executive committee of the Republican Jewish Coalition of Los Angeles, being a member of the National Young Leadership Cabinet of the United Jewish Commuties organization, and serving on various local committees of the Jewish Federation of Los Angeles. Prior involvements include serving on the regional board of the Anti-Defamation League as well as various young leadership development activities within the Jewish National Fund. She is the child of a survivor of Auschwitz.
  
  

• Terri Smooke serves as Executive Director of the Holocaust Era Insurance Claims Oversight Committee. HEICOC works with the California Department of Insurance to provide support and advocacy for Holocaust survivors in California with regard to insurance claims, restitution and related concerns. As Special Assistant to Governor Gray Davis, in addition to working with Israel, advising on Holocaust issues and the Jewish community of California on all issues of concern, she served as a policy advisor in a variety of areas. Smooke has worked as a community activist for more than 30 years holding many leadership positions. Currently she sits on the boards of the National Women's Philanthropy of United Jewish Communities, UNICEF, the Jewish Federation in Los Angeles, Israel Policy Forum and others. She chaired the Women's Campaign for the United Jewish Fund, served as Vice-President of the Jewish Federation in Los Angeles, and chaired the Modern and Contemporary Art Council at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.
  
  
• David Spence (ex officio member) earned a B.A. degree in history from the University of Rochester, and M.S. in education from State University of New York at Albany and a Ph.D. in higher education from SUNY/Buffalo. He has been the Executive Vice Chancellor and Chief Academic Officer of the California State University since April 1998. Before coming to California, he worked in similar positions for university systems in Georgia and Florida. He has served as Vice President and Director of the Office of Educational Policies at the Southern Regional Education Board, Executive Director of the Florida Postsecondary Education Planning Commission, and Assistant Director of the Academic Administration Program for the United Board for College Development.

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