Senior Leadership
Office of the President
Rabbi Dr. Ari Berman
Rabbi Dr. Ari Berman
President and Rosh Yeshiva
and Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Theological Seminary (RIETS)
646.592.4300 | president@yu.edu
Selma Botman, PhD
Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs
212.960.5217 | Selma.Botman@yu.edu
Dr. Botman, who grew up outside of Boston, holds a BA in Psychology from Brandeis University, a B.Phil. in Middle Eastern studies from Oxford University, and an AM in Middle Eastern Studies and PhD in History and Middle Eastern Studies from Harvard University. A scholar of modern Middle Eastern politics and society, she has published three books and a number of scholarly articles. She has also taught a range of courses on the Modern Middle East and international development.
Provost Botman has dedicated her career to higher education and has served in leadership positions at the University of Massachusetts, the University of Southern Maine, and The City University of New York. Under her leadership as provost and Executive Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs, CUNY created a School of Public Health, an Institute for Demographic Research, a master¹s program in Middle Eastern Studies, and CUNY's first-ever online degree. Provost Botman also headed a Campaign for Student Success which set out to ensure that more students successfully graduated from the colleges of the university.
As the president of the University of Southern Maine, she inspired new academic programs, raised scholarship dollars for students who would have otherwise been unable to attend the university, and promoted technology assisted instruction. Dr. Botman's commitment to campus engagement with local communities resulted in a five-campus environmental studies initiative at the University of Massachusetts that addressed community needs during her tenure. As Vice President for Academic Affairs at UMass, she strengthened technology and engineering education throughout Massachusetts by bringing together K-12 teachers, university faculty, and retired engineers to design new programs that were introduced to secondary schools, and helped create UMass Online.
Dr. Botman has also taught at the College of the Holy Cross where she was involved in international programs and promoted Middle Eastern studies.
Michael D. Schreiber, MBA, CPA
Vice President of Business Affairs and Chief Financial Officer
Michael.Schreiber@yu.edu | 646.592.4226
Michael Schreiber is ’s Vice President for Business Affairs and Chief Financial Officer. Michael leads the University's finance functions and plays an integral role in developing and implementing the financial and operational plans to support and meet the strategic goals set by the University.
Michael served as the Assistant Vice President for Finance and Chief Treasury Officer of the University since 2015. Prior to joining the University, Michael held various positions within the financial markets, including Partner at FNY Capital, Portfolio Manager at SAC Capital, and Vice President at JP Morgan. Michael is also a Certified Public Accountant.
Michael received his BS in Accounting from the University’s Sy Syms School of Business and his MBA in Finance and International Business from New York University’s Leonard N. Stern School of Business.
Erica Brown
Vice Provost for Values and Leadership and Director of the Sacks-Herenstein Center
Dr. Erica Brown is the Vice Provost for Values and Leadership at and the founding director of its Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks-Herenstein Center for Values and Leadership. She was both a faculty member and a student of Rabbi Sacks’ at Jews’ College, where Rabbi Sacks served as her Masters’ thesis advisor. Erica previously served as the director of the Mayberg Center for Jewish Education and Leadership and an associate professor of curriculum and pedagogy at The George Washington University. Erica is the author of twelve books on leadership, the Hebrew Bible and spirituality. Erica has a daily podcast, “Take Your Soul to Work.” Her latest book Esther: Power, Fate and Fragility in Exile (Maggid) was a finalist for the National Jewish Book Award.
Erica is also the author of Jonah: The Reluctant Prophet, Take Your Soul to Work: 365 Meditations on Every Day Leadership and Happier Endings: A Meditation on Life and Death (Simon and Schuster), which won both the Wilbur and Nautilus awards for spiritual writing. Her previous books include Inspired Jewish Leadership, a National Jewish Book Award finalist, Spiritual Boredom, Confronting Scandal and co-authored The Case for Jewish Peoplehood (All Jewish Lights). She also wrote Seder Talk: A Conversational Haggada, Leadership in the Wilderness, In the Narrow Places and Return: Daily Inspiration for the Days of Awe (All OU/Koren). She is currently working on a commentary on Ecclesiastes (Maggid).
She has been published in the New York Times, The Atlantic, Tablet, First Things, and The Jewish Review of Books and wrote a monthly column for the New York Jewish Week. She has blogged for Psychology Today, Newsweek/Washington Post’s “On Faith” and JTA and tweeted on one page of Talmud study a day at DrEricaBrown. She has master’s degrees from the Institute of Education (University of London), Jews’ College (University of London) and Harvard University and a Ph.D. from Baltimore Hebrew University. Erica was a Jerusalem Fellow, is a faculty member of the Wexner Foundation, an Avi Chai Fellow and the recipient of the 2009 Covenant Award for her work in education. She was the scholar-in-residence at both The Jewish Federation of Greater Washington and the Combined Jewish Philanthropies of Boston and as the community scholar for the Jewish Center of New York. She currently serves as a community scholar for Congregation Etz Chaim in Livingston, NJ.
Ellen Finkelstein
Chief Strategy Officer for the Office of Institutional Advancement
646.592.4491 | ellen.finkelstein@yu.edu
Ellen Finkelstein is ’s Chief Strategy Officer, IA and shares the responsibility of managing the Office of Institutional Advancement. She is responsible for the strategic direction of the Rise Up Campaign, as well overseeing Advancement Operations, Alumni Affairs, Annual Fund, Corporate and Foundation Giving, IA Marketing and Communications, Fundraising Events and Community Engagement.
Ellen began her career as a management consultant at Accenture, where she spent nearly a decade. She moved into the Jewish non-profit world and has worked in various positions at The Kaplen JCC, Jewish Federation of Northern NJ, and Jewish Family & Children’s Services before joining in 2018.
She received a BA in English from University of Virginia.
Patrick V. Gallagher, MBA
Vice President of Administrative Services
Chief Administrative Services Officer
646.592.4008 | patrick.gallagher@yu.edu
Patrick Gallagher is 's Vice President of Administrative Services and Chief Administrative Services Officer. He develops and oversees Yeshiva's people, space, and technology strategies, as well as directs the university's capital planning and campus development. Patrick has line management responsibility for Human Resources, Information Technology, Facilities Management, Security, Food Services, and Campus Operations.
Mr. Gallagher has two decades of experience leading operations and developing and executing institutional strategy, primarily in the higher education and healthcare industries. Prior to joining Yeshiva, he spent over 10 years at Weill Cornell Medicine, one of the nation’s premier academic medical and research institutions. His final role at Weill Cornell Medicine was as the head of Operations and Support Services, In that position, Patrick led Human Resources, Housing, Facilities Management, Risk Management, and Emergency Management.
Patrick holds a BS in Political Science and history from Eastern Michigan University and an MBA from the University of North Carolina, Kenan-Flagler Business School . He has served on Aetna’s Client Advisory Council, TIAA’s HR Leadership Exchange and Emerging Leader Advisory Boards, and Vanguard’s 403B Advisory Council.
Andrew J. Lauer, Esq., JD, LLM
Vice President for Legal Affairs, Secretary and General Counsel
212.960.0051 | andrewlauer@yu.edu
Andrew ''Avi'' Lauer serves as 's Vice President for Legal Affairs, Secretary and General Counsel. In this capacity, he is responsible for all legal matters pertaining to and its affiliates within the United States and abroad. As a member of the senior leadership of the University and its affiliates, Avi has responsibility for many business and operational matters, including enterprise risk management, international operations in Israel and Canada, and he serves as Vice President of University affiliates, High Schools and the Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Theological Seminary.
Prior to his appointment at , Avi was a partner at the international law firm of Thelen Reid Brown Raysman and Steiner LLP, where he maintained a large and diverse practice while also serving as an active leader of Thelen's labor and employment law department. Avi served as relationship partner to numerous clients in various areas of legal specialty, including corporate, real estate, litigation, technology, outsourcing, bankruptcy, patent and trademark, and he often functioned as outside general counsel to many companies. He also established and maintained an extensive Israel Practice at Thelen and worked with many Israeli-owned and/or affiliated companies and regularly traveled to Israel to meet with his Israeli clients and contacts.
Lauer also has prior professional experience as Senior Employment Counsel in the Office of General Counsel of PricewaterhouseCoopers Consulting (PwC Consulting), where he was responsible for all employment-law-related matters affecting the firm and its more than 30,000 employees. In addition, he was responsible for all in-house employment-law-related matters pertaining to the planned IPO and ultimate sale of PwC Consulting to IBM. Before joining PwC, he served as Assistant General Counsel of Deloitte & Touche USA, where he was employment counsel to both Deloitte & Touche LLP and Deloitte Consulting L.P.
Early in his career, serving as an Assistant District Attorney in the Kings County District Attorney's Office in Brooklyn, NY, Lauer conducted numerous trials and investigations and was assigned to several bureaus, including the elite Trial Cadre unit of the Homicide Bureau.
Involved in numerous community causes, Lauer serves and/or has served on the Executive Board of several charitable organizations in the New York area. He is a former president of the Young Israel of Woodmere, former chairman of the Board of Trustees and honorary past-president of the Hebrew Academy of the Five Towns and Rockaway, and a member of the Audit Committee and Long Island Board of Ohel Family and Children's Services. He also served as pro bono counsel to several organizations and not-for-profits, including the Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America and Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts.
Avi holds rabbinic ordination and has published numerous articles. He is a frequent public speaker throughout the United States and abroad on topics including law, business, religious law, community leadership and governance, as well as the intersection of such topics.
Susan A. Meyers, MSW
Vice President and Chief Advancement Officer, Department of Institutional Advancement
646.592.6885 | meyers@yu.edu
Susan Meyers is the Chief Advancement Officer of in the office of Institutional Advancement. Susan oversees fundraising for all of ’s graduate and undergraduate schools and manages the team that is leading the fundraising efforts for the Rise Up Campaign. She spearheads the major gifts fundraising initiatives for the University and works closely with the President on principal and major gifts.
Prior to this role Susan was a Senior Philanthropic Advisor and Principals Gifts Officer in the Office of Institutional Advancement. Susan has also worked at AMIT as well as the Wall Street Division of UJA-Federation of New York.
Susan is a proud Stern College graduate and earned a Master’s in Social Work from Columbia University’s School of Social Work with a concentration in Social Administration.
Julie Schreier, MBA
Vice President and Chief of Staff
646.592.4305 | Julie.Schreier@yu.edu
Julie Schreier is chief of staff in the Office of the President and supports the President and senior leadership of the University on a wide range of strategic issues. She is the primary liaison through which members of the community—trustees, faculty, students, and staff—communicate with the President, and is responsible for ensuring progress on major University-wide initiatives.
Schreier has spent the past seven years in ’s Department of Institutional Advancement, where she served in various leadership roles, including director of the Long Island region and assistant vice president of institutional advancement for the Office of the President. She has strong ties to the University, having graduated Samuel H. Wang High School for Girls, Stern College for Women, and Wurzweiler School of Social Work’s Certificate Program in Jewish Philanthropy. She also received an MBA from Baruch College. Her parents and husband are proud alumni and her children have graduated or currently attend schools.
Doron Stern, MBA
Vice President of Marketing and Communications and Chief Marketing and Enrollment Officer
646.592.6315 | doron.stern@yu.edu
Doron Stern is ’s Vice President of Communications. He oversees all University communications and marketing activities, including branding, media relations, print and digital marketing, websites and social media outreach.
Stern has more than 20 years of marketing leadership experience. Prior to joining the University he was Chief Marketing Officer for GoHealth Urgent Care, where he tripled growth within two years to reach 80 urgent care centers across four markets. He has also held senior marketing positions at Chobani LLC, Popcorn Indiana, IDT Corporation and L’Oreal USA.
Stern received a BA in history from Brandeis University and an MBA in marketing from New York University. He is a graduate of the Marsha Stern Talmudical Academy/ High School for Boys.
Danielle Wozniak, MSW, PhD
Vice President Global Strategy and Development
danielle.wozniak@yu.edu
Dr. Danielle Wozniak is a transformative administrator, an innovative strategist, and academic leader who draws on an entrepreneurial spirit to drive growth and organizational change. She brings to an enterprising voice with a passion for online and hybrid learning and the positive development of tomorrow’s workforce leaders.
Dr. Wozniak was appointed Vice President for Global Strategy and Business Development in August 2022. Prior to this appointment she served as Dean of the Wurzweiler School of Social Work at and grew the school into a thriving academic unit with broad reach into multiple national and international communities.
During the early winter of 2020, while still dean, Dr. Wozniak began to talk with leadership about competency-based, employment focused, online learning through stackable certificates. Those seeds sprouted and she was asked to start Global in 2022. Dr. Wozniak is passionate about three things: making high quality education accessible through distance learning, education that changes an individual’s life trajectory, and education in service of repairing a fractured world.
She received her bachelor’s degree in English literature at Miami University of Ohio, a master’s in social work from Fordham University, a sixth-year certificate in educational leadership from the University of Hartford and a PhD in anthropology from the University of Connecticut. She has assumed leadership roles at the university of New England, the University of New Haven and the College of New Rochelle. She gained promotion and tenure at the University of Montana where she also stepped into leadership working with tribal and non-tribal undergraduate social work students. Drawing on expertise in social work and anthropology, she is the author of several books and articles on kinship through US based fosterage and post-traumatic growth.