The Columbia Holocaust Education Commission Speakers Bureau is comprised of children and grandchildren of survivors, k-12 educators, university professors, and authors. Members teach students and adults by speaking in classrooms, religious and lay institutions, companies, and community venues. Through accounts of the Holocaust and genocide, students and adults learn about the importance of tolerance, embracing diversity, and combating hatred.
Speakers For Schools
To request a speaker for your school, please complete this Speakers Bureau Request Form at least two weeks before your preferred program date.
Speakers For Organizations
To request a speaker for your company or organization, please complete this Speakers Bureau Request Form at least two weeks before your preferred program date.
Frank W. Baker
Frank Baker is a longtime member of Columbia’s Jewish Community. His work background has included broadcast journalism, and K-12 education. For the past 20+ years he has been a passionate proponent of “media literacy” and has conducted hundreds of workshops with teachers. He recently conducted a “visual literacy” workshop with Holocaust educators in our state. His interest in education involves helping write teaching standards for both English Language Arts as well as Visual Performing Arts. He is the author of four books. He has two sons and a step daughter. He is married to Melanie Walker Baker. They have four grandchildren.
Lilly Filler
Dr. Lilly Stern Filler grew up in Columbia, SC and graduated from AC Flora High School. She graduated college from the University of Wisconsin in Physical Therapy, and moved to NY to work at NYU Medical Center. It was in NYC that she met her husband to be, Bruce Filler, also a physical therapist. They moved to Boston where she received her Masters degree in Physical Therapy from Boston University and taught at Northeastern University. Following the birth of her first child, the Fillers moved back to Columbia to create and work in their private Physical Therapy Clinic, the Columbia Rehabilitation Clinic.
After the birth of her third child, Lilly enrolled in Medical School at USC. She became a physician, completing her training in Obstetrics and Gynecology and opening Women Physicians Associates, Ob/Gyn in 1992. She became active in medical politics and served as the first female Chief of Staff at Palmetto Richland Hospital and President of the Columbia Medical Society. She retired from her medical practice in July, 2014 and has since fully devoted herself to community and philanthropic projects. She has held leadership positions in medical and community organizations.
Lilly Stern is a daughter of Holocaust survivors, Jadzia and Ben Stern, obm. She was born in Munich, Germany and immigrated with her parents to SC in, June, 1949. She is the oldest of 4 children and has had a strong interest in Holocaust education for many years. In 2000, she chaired the oversight of the Columbia Holocaust Memorial at Memorial park in Columbia and the subsequent Columbia Holocaust Education Commission (CHEC), CHEC is an active local volunteer group that has developed a powerful “Holocaust Remembered” exhibit, available on line to view and as a power point for teachers. Dr. Filler was appointed to the SC Council of the Holocaust by the Governor in 2010 and is in her 5th year as Chair. She edits an annual publication, Holocaust Remembered which is distributed throughout SC. She also serves on the International Board of the Association of Holocaust Organizations.
Dr. Filler strongly feels that as time progresses the lessons of the Holocaust could be forgotten and it is only through hearing the individual stories and learning about the horrors that we can say “Never Forgotten, Never Again.”
Henry Goldberg
Story Consultant
Henry D. Goldberg was born in June 1948 to Polish-Jewish parents Felix and Bluma Goldberg, who were Holocaust survivors. He was born in an American-run Displaced Persons camp in Landsberg, Germany.
As a small child he immigrated with his parents to the United States in 1949. They made their home in Columbia, South Carolina where his father got a job as a janitor in a tile store. Henry attended public schools in Columbia and he graduated from the University of Georgia with a Bachelor’s Degree in Business Administration in 1970. From 1970 to 1976, Henry served in the South Carolina Air National Guard at the McEntire ANG Base.
In 1972, he married Gloria Goldberg and they have two sons, Jason and Adam. Jason now lives in Charleston and Adam resides in Los Angeles, California. Henry and Gloria Goldberg have three grandchildren.
Henry worked for his father at the Tile Center for twelve years before beginning his own business in 1982. Following in his father’s footsteps of entrepreneurship, he is the Founder and President of Palmetto Tile Distributors.
Henry is a strong supporter of the Jewish community. He has served on the Beth Shalom Synagogue Board of Directors for many years. He served two one-year terms of President of the Columbia Jewish Community Center and also as the President of the Columbia Jewish Foundation. He has additionally been a former Board of Trustees Member of the Central Carolina Community Foundation. He is also a staunch supporter of efforts to strengthen Holocaust education and awareness to ensure that the stories of his family and so many others remain alive.
Karl Goldberg
Karl Goldberg was born on June 26, 1953, in Columbia, South Carolina, just four years after his parents, Bluma and Felix Goldberg, immigrated to the United States. He graduated from the University of South Carolina in 1976 with a degree in Sociology. During his tenure at USC, Karl spent a semester abroad at a kibbutz in Israel. He then returned to Columbia to work in the family business.
Karl has served on the board of Beth Shalom Synagogue, the Columbia Jewish Community Center, and the committee that plans the Holocaust Memorial Day service. He was Chairman of the Youth Basketball league for the JCC and coached both girls’ and boys’ basketball teams. He has spent the last twenty years speaking to groups across the state about his parent’s experience during the Holocaust. His mission is to educate the public, especially students, about the atrocities of the Holocaust, by personalizing his parent’s story.
Today, Karl is proud to continue his parent’s legacy as an owner and President of Tile Center Inc., the business his parents started in 1957. He is an avid sports fan, especially following the South Carolina Gamecocks, and enjoys boating, fishing, gardening, and traveling. He and his wife, Margo, have two children, Philip Goldberg, and Robin Roth, one granddaughter and twin girls on the way.
Esther Greenberg
Story Consultant
Esther Greenberg was born in February, 1957, in Columbia, South Carolina. She was the youngest of three children whose parents, Bluma and Felix Goldberg, survived the Holocaust and immigrated to the United States.
The year Esther was born, her father Felix established The Tile Center, a successful tile business that Esther still works in today. Esther’s mother, Bluma, worked in the business for over twenty years.
Esther received a Bachelor of Science degree, studying nutrition, from the University of Georgia, and worked as a Registered Dietitian for ten years. She married Ira Greenberg in 1981, and they have three children, Leah, Rachel, and Sam. Leah lives in Atlanta, Georgia: Rachel resides in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; and Sam is in Columbia, South Carolina. Esther and Ira have two grandchildren.
As co-owner of the Tile Center, Esther is still actively working in the business. Additionally, Esther is highly involved in the Columbia Jewish Community.
She served as President of the Columbia Jewish Federation for two years, and has served on its board for many years. She is currently co-chair of the Columbia Holocaust Education Commission, whose mission is to promote Holocaust education throughout South Carolina. Esther often speaks to students and other community groups to tell her parents story.
Lyssa Harvey
Lyssa Harvey, Ed.S is a Licensed Professional Counselor. She owns The Art and Play Therapy Center of SC. where she specializes in helping children and their families as an Art and Play Therapist. Mrs. Harvey has been a frequent speaker at conferences throughout the States on using Art and Play in Counseling. Over the years as a Licensed Professional Counselor- Supervisor she has credentialed many therapists for the South Carolina Department of Labor, Licensing and Review Board. For her commitment for serving children with special needs she was appointed as a Commissioner for the South Carolina Department of Special Needs.
Mrs. Harvey is also known for her work as a visual artist. She is a South Carolina Water media Society signature artist. Her work is represented in galleries in Columbia and Charleston. Her special work in Judaica Art is part of collections all over the States.
Mrs. Harvey is passionate about creating a better community by being active in the arts, the environment and Holocaust Education. Mrs. Harvey has been active in many leadership roles in the Columbia nonprofit community. Over the years she served on Family Connections, Workshop Theatre, 701 Center for Contemporary Art, and was the chair of Keep the Midlands Beautiful. She is active in Historic Columbia Jewish Heritage Initiative, the Columbia Jewish Community Center and Beth Shalom Synagogue Board of Directors. During her 20 years as the co-chair of The Columbia Holocaust Education Commission she helped create The Holocaust Remembered Exhibit. Thousands of South Carolina students and individuals have viewed this Holocaust Exhibit dedicated to South Carolina Holocaust survivor and liberator stories.
Marisa Kornblut
Hailing from Charleston, SC and daughter of Jack and Barbara Rosenberg, Marisa Rosenberg Kornblut is the child of a WWII Veteran and a Holocaust survivor. Marisa and husband Philip have been married for 43 years and reside in Columbia, SC. Their children Ashley and Hayden are both married and have given them four adorable grandchildren to date.
Marisa attended The Charleston Hebrew Institute and The High School of Charleston. She earned a BA in Elementary Education from The University of SC. and a certificate as a “Self-Sufficiency Coordinator”. Throughout her career, Kornblut taught for 22 years in the Richland One Public School System with a passion for the sciences, taught Hebrew School in the Jewish Community for 25 years, worked with public housing residents for 3 years encouraging self-sufficiency, and served on The Foster Care Review Board for a decade.
Henry Miller
Dr. Henry Miller grew up in Columbia and is married and has two grown children. His parents, Cela and David Miller, were survivors of the Holocaust and immigrated to Columbia, SC in 1949. Dr. Miller attended USC before receiving his Doctorate in Optometry from Southern College of Optometry in Memphis, TN where he met his wife, Minda. He completed an internship at Fort Campbell, KY Army Hospital. He has just recently retired after 37 years in private practice. Dr. Miller is a member of the Midlands Optometric Society, the South Carolina Optometric Association, and the American Optometric Association. He is a member of Beth Shalom Synagogue in Columbia, SC and serves on the Yom Hashoah Committee. He currently serves on the board of the Columbia Jewish Federation.
Federica Schoeman
F. K. Schoeman devoted her life to the study of Jewish culture and Holocaust memory since a very young age. She was born in Rome, Italy, lived and studied in Poland, Ukraine, the Czech Republic, Russia, and in Israel before moving to the United States for her graduate studies. She holds a Master’s Degree in Near Eastern and Judaic Studies from Brandeis University and a Ph.D. in Comparative Literature from the Graduate Center City University of New York.
She moved to South Carolina, from Manhattan, in 2008, to join the faculty of the then newly-established Jewish Studies Program at the University of South Carolina. She is Associate Professor of English and Jewish Studies and teaches courses about Holocaust representations in literature, films, museums and memorials. She chaired the Jewish Studies Program as interim director in 2015 and later as Director from 2017 to 2022.
She publishes extensively about the Holocaust and, in particular, about Jewish women’s historical experiences. Her article about French philosopher and Holocaust survivor Sarah Kofman “Nightbirds, Nightmares and the Mothers’ Smile” won the national Florence Howe Award for Feminist Scholarship.
Schoeman yearly contributes to the Holocaust Supplement distributed throughout our region’s newspapers network. She is a public intellectual who tirelessly gives talks, lectures and radio interviews about past or current Anti-Semitism, the Holocaust and its impact on our politics and history.
She is the author of Holocaust Mothers and Daughters: Family, History and Trauma.
Abraham Wandersman
Abraham Wandersman, PhD, is President and CEO of the Wandersman Center and Distinguished Professor Emeritus at the University of South Carolina. He performs work in implementation science, program evaluation, community psychology and transdisciplinary research and action at the Wandersman Center. Dr. Wandersman has received numerous awards for program evaluation and research and action. Dr. Wandersman served as the president of the Society for Community Research and Action.
