Meet the Team

Executive Director, Human Rights Institute

Dr. Adara Goldberg (she/her/hers) is the Executive Director of the Holocaust Resource & Education Center and Human Rights Institute (Union, NJ). Since earning her doctorate in Holocaust History at Clark University (2012), Dr. Goldberg has held an Azrieli Foundation fellowship at Hebrew University, a Post-doc fellowship at Stockton University, and served as education director for the Vancouver Holocaust Education Center. Recipient of the Marsid Foundation Prize at the 2016 Western Canada Jewish Book Awards, Dr. Goldberg’s book, Holocaust Survivors in Canada: Exclusion, Inclusion, Transformation, 1947–1955 (2015), represented the first comprehensive analysis of the resettlement and integration experiences of 35,000 Holocaust survivors and their families in postwar Canada. Recent contributions include: "Making Present the Past: Canada's St. Louis Apology and Canadian Jewry's Pursuit of Justice," in Kuehne and Rein, eds., Agency and the Holocaust: Essays in Honor of Debórah Dwork (2020), and “‘He’ll make a good companion for my son:’ War Orphan Adoption in Postwar Canada,” in Kangisser Cohen and Ofer, eds., Starting Anew: The Rehabilitation of Child Survivors of the Holocaust in the Early Postwar Years (2020). She has also contributed to the publications Never Far Apart (2015) and Too Many Goodbyes: The Diaries of Susan Garfield (2019), and edited the memoir, Always Remember Who You Are (2017). Dr. Goldberg served as a consultant for the Azrieli Foundation, and is a featured historian for the Montreal Holocaust Museum virtual exhibition, Building New Lives.  Her current research projects explore the phenomenon of post-genocidal familial reconstruction, and the role of national apologies in collective memory. At Kean University, she also teaches the undergraduate course ID 1800 Holocaust, Genocide, and Modern Humanity, and graduate courses History of the Holocaust I and II, Holocaust Genocide Research, and Jewish Survival Strategies.

Managing Assistant Director, Human Rights Institute 

Sarah Coykendall (she/her/hers) is the Managing Assistant Director of Education and Outreach at the Holocaust Resource & Education Center and Human Rights Institute, where she also received her M.A. (2018) in Holocaust and Genocide Studies. She received her B.S. in History and B.A. in Anthropology (2015) from SUNY Oneonta. Her graduate research examined the Holocaust using the historical and personal consciousness of third generation Holocaust survivors and American-Jewish millennials. Sarah is a leading educator on the Holocaust, contemporary antisemitism, human rights and inclusion. She gives presentations for students, teachers, and community members across the state and teaches undergraduate courses at Kean University on the Holocaust, justice and human rights, civil rights, and the transfer student experience. In 2019, she received the SUNY Oneonta Alumni Association Top 30 Under 30 Award. She is a 2022 Jewish Foundation for the Righteous Alfred Lerner Fellow. She attended the 2023 & 2025 JFR Advanced Seminars and the 2023 JFR European Study Program. She attended the Leo Baeck Summer University for Jewish Studies at the Humboldt-Universität of Berlin and was a student of German Language at the Julius-Maximilians Universität Würzburg. She interned at the Holocaust Museum and Center for Tolerance and Education in Suffern, NY and worked as the Assistant to the Director of the Jewish Studies Program at Kean University. Her latest endeavors include Goal Leader for the Engagement Subcommittee of the Sustainability Task Force, Advisor on the Interfaith Council, Content Area Subcommittee Lead for the Task Force on Advising, and Secretary of the NTLC Committee.

Academic Specialist, Human Rights Institute

Kyra Dezjot (she/her/hers) is the Academic Specialist at Kean University’s Human Rights Institute and a second-year doctoral student in Modern American History at Fordham University. She investigates American Jewish communities, antisemitism, and how the Holocaust as an event impacted these communities. Kyra has an MA in Holocaust and Genocide Studies from Kean University and undergraduate degrees in History and Secondary Education from Salve Regina University. She recently published an article in Perspectives on History, the AHA’s newsmagazine, on teaching the Holocaust from a person-centered approach.

"Human rights are important to me because they protect the dignity and freedom of every person, ensuring that all individuals are treated with fairness and respect. They provide a foundation for justice, equality, and the ability to live without fear or oppression."

Graduate Assistant, Human Rights Institute

Kim Rokohl (they/them/theirs) is the Graduate Assistant at Kean University's Human Rights Institute and a third-year School Counseling with LPC Master's student at Kean University. They also have a Bachelor's degree in Psychology, giving them the education necessary in enacting change. Kim is an LGBTQIA+ advocate, aiming to highlight the strengths and triumphs within the community, as well as provide a pillar of hope for future generations. They aspire to instill a message of equity, inclusion, and acceptance of all through their future workings as a School Counselor. 

"Human Rights are important to me because all people should be guaranteed a decent quality of life just for being here; not for what they do, who they are, or who they may know. There should be no buts when it comes to Human Rights."

Student Assistant, Human Rights Institute

Yerlin Holguin 

"Human rights are important to me because we are born with them. They are not privileges to be earned, but instead something we are entitled to because we exist."