Online Business Faculty

Academic Director, Mitzner MS in Real Estate Program
Assistant Professor of Finance and Real Estate
Vice Chairman, Department of Finance

PhD, Rutgers Business School, Rutgers University, 2014
MBA, Johnson Graduate School of Management, Cornell University, 1997
BA, Vassar College, 1989

Dr. Andreas Christopoulos is the academic director of undergraduate and graduate real estate programming at Yeshiva University’s Sy Syms School of Business. He joined Sy Syms as a visiting assistant professor of finance and real estate in 2017 and was promoted to the tenure track in 2020. He engages in teaching, scholarly research activities and managing the Mitzner MSRE program. Dr. Christopoulos joined Yeshiva after holding positions at Rice University, the University of Texas at Austin and the University of Scranton in Pennsylvania. He earned his Ph.D. in Quantitative Finance from Rutgers University in 2014 under the direction of Robert Jarrow, Douglas Jones, S. Abraham Ravid, and Andrejz Ruszczńyski. He has an MBA from Cornell University and a BA from Vassar College.

Prior to academia, Dr. Christopoulos served in a number of senior executive roles in the securitization industry. He is the former head of CMBS risk management at Nomura, where he successfully managed the credit, liquidity, and market risks of a $3 billion portfolio of CMBS, CMBX, CRE CDOs and CRE whole loans during the financial crisis in 2007-2008. Those strategies were informed by prior experiences hedging, trading and researching CMBS at JP Morgan Chase from 1997-2001, most recently as the head of CMBS research, and through his role as the co-founder and CEO of the CMBS risk management software company, WOTN co-founded with Robert Jarrow and Cornell University. Dr. Christopoulos began his professional career at Lehman Brothers in mortgage securitization.

Dr. Christopoulos’ research interests focus on asset pricing and valuation of liquidity and default risks for CRE loans and related real estate derivatives with a particular focus on credit-sensitive securitized products. His work has been broadly reviewed across the globe by academic peers and professionals alike. He is an active speaker at many national and international academic conferences and industry seminars hosted by thought leaders in the financial community. His recent work includes the projection of synthetic cap rates from macroeconomic variables, loan and bond risk premia decomposition, and the microstructure of CMBS and CMBX, and he is the co-inventor of USPTO 8788404 B1 "Structured finance securities option pricing architecture and process."

Adjunct Professor

Michael has recently joined the practice of Financial Investigative Services as a partner where he utilizes his skills as a forensic accountant to investigate whistleblower claims, provide litigation support services, and render tax controversy advisory services.

Michael recently transitioned from the Internal Revenue Service after 30 years of service. Michael began his career with the IRS as a revenue agent where he audited taxpayers across the spectrum from small business owners up to large-capitalization public entities. In 2001, Michael was appointed as a special agent and trained for over 6 months at the Federal Law Enforcement Training Academy in Georgia. After 9/11, Michael joined a multi-agency task force investigating the financial activities of suspected terrorists. Early in his career, Michael coordinated undercover stings of unethical return preparers. Michael later served on the Department of Justice task forces investigating tax shelter crimes and bankruptcy fraud crimes. Michael closed his career with the IRS investigating executive officers of publicly-traded companies for a wide range of tax crimes.

Michael has been an instructor in Yeshiva University's MSA and MST programs since 2009 teaching a wide range of accounting and tax courses including Forensic Accounting, Governmental Accounting, and Tax Practice & Research. Michael earned his CPA, CFE, MBA, and MS in taxation.

Michael is the treasurer and a board member of the Mogen Safety Council, a non-profit entity formed to protect Jewish institutions from physical and terroristic threats.

Assistant Professor of Accounting

PhD, Rutgers Business School, 2020
BS, Excelsior College, 2013

Dr. Yehuda Davis is an assistant professor of accounting at the Sy Syms School of Business at Yeshiva University. He holds a BS from Excelsior College and a PhD in Accounting from Rutgers Business School. Professor Davis currently teaches Intermediate Accounting I & II. Before joining Yeshiva University, he also taught Accounting for Managers in the Executive MBA program at Rutgers Business School. His current research focuses on building and empirically testing theoretical models in accounting and finance. He is specifically interested in the intersection of accounting, finance, and the law, as well as asset pricing, taxation, and the theory of regulations.

Director, Online MBA Program
Clinical Associate Professor of Strategy and Entrepreneurship

JD, University of California (Managing Editor, Law Review)
MBA, New York University
BA, Oberlin College

Mark Finkel has been deeply involved in early-stage entrepreneurial enterprises for the past 25 years. Over that time, Mark has worked as an executive or active board member of numerous high-growth technology companies on the east coast, in Silicon Valley and in Israel. Mark has significant international operational experience, having set up distribution channels and operations in both Europe and Asia. He was also the founder and chairman of RightAnswers, an enterprise software company, which was sold to Upland Software in 2017.

Many of the companies he has been involved with have had successful exits. He has taken four companies public as chief financial officer and many other companies have had M&A exits. Most recently, Mark served at the board level for JUMP Bikes, which was bought by Uber in May 2018.

Mark has been involved in numerous social entrepreneurship ventures as well. As chairman of the Special Kids Fund, he has pioneered the concept of a charity gift card. He has also been involved in economic development work overseas.

Mark’s academic interests revolve around helping students understand and apply the skills and concepts underlying successful entrepreneurship. These include understanding the dynamics of nascent markets, as well as those of disruptive entrants into existing markets. Of particular interest to Mark are the management skills needed to scale the entrepreneurial venture through its growth phases. Also important to Mark is understanding the characteristics of the products or services offered by the early stage enterprise that are more likely to lead to success.

Mark serves on the board of directors or advisory board of a number of companies and nonprofit organizations.

Clinical Associate Professor

C.P.A., New York

Candidate for Doctorate in Education, Azrieli Graduate School, Yeshiva University, 2021

APC– Taxation, Graduate School of Business Administration, New York University, 1979

MBA with distinction, specialized in Accounting. Recipient of University Scholarship. Elected to Beta Gamma Sigma Scholastic Honor Society, Graduate School of Business Administration, New York University, 1975

BS cum laude, specialized in Economics. Elected member of Disciplinary Committee. Kirschenbaum Memorial Award. City College of the City University of New York, 1972

As a Tax and Accounting professor for over 10 years and the former Director of the Graduate Tax Program at Sy Syms School of Business of Yeshiva University, Len acquired decades of practical, hands on tax experience in leadership positions at major global businesses, including PwC, Schlumberger Ltd, Citigroup, and most recently with NYSE conglomerate, Griffon Corp, where he was the Vice President of Taxes.

Associate Dean, Sy Syms School of Business
Chair of Information and Decision Sciences Department
Professor of Operations Management and Statistics

PhD, Stern School of Business, NYU, 2000
MPhil, Stern School of Business, NYU, 1998
MS, Stern School of Business, NYU, 1997
BA, College of Arts and Sciences, NYU, 1994

Dr. Avi Giloni received his PhD in statistics and operations research from the Leonard Stern School of Business at New York University. He is associate dean and an associate professor of operations management and statistics at Sy Syms School of Business. He is also the school's area coordinator for Information and Decision Sciences.

He teaches various courses, including Operations Management and Statistics, in which he stresses students' understanding and modeling of randomness and risk. His areas of research include robust forecasting, optimization, and stochastic system designs and their applications to supply chain management.

He is the coauthor of articles such as “Neo-Rawlsian Fringes: A New Approach to Market Segmentation and New Product Development,” “Mathematical Programming Approach for Improving the Robustness of LAD Regression,” “Robust Weighted LAD Regression,” “Robust Analysis of Variance: Process Design and Quality Improvement,” and “Information Sharing in a Supply Chain Under ARMA Demand.”

Director, Online MS in Accounting Program
Professor of Accounting

PhD, C.T. Bauer College of Business, University of Houston, 2005
LLM, Law School, University of Houston, 2001
MS, C.T. Bauer College of Business, University of Houston, 2001
BA, Law School, Peking (Beijing) University, 1996

Dr. Henry Huang is an associate professor of accounting at Yeshiva University’s Sy Syms School of Business. Professor Huang’s research focuses on the impact of external monitoring mechanisms (e.g., securities litigation, shareholder rights, regulations, and hedge fund activism) on company accounting practice and cost of capital. Recent research interests also include the value relevance of climate risk, data security, and religiosity. Professor Huang has been published in a number of top journals in the areas of accounting, finance and business, including The Accounting Review, Contemporary Accounting Research, Journal of Financial Economics, Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, and Journal of International Business Studies.

Professor Huang’s current teaching interests are managerial accounting, contemporary topics in accounting, and accounting research based on FASB codification and eIFRS.

Professor Huang’s practical expertise covers financial statement analysis, accounting-related securities litigation, auditing, and entrepreneurial planning.

Director, Online MS in Accounting Program
Professor of Accounting

PhD, Wharton School of Business, University of Pennsylvania, 1990
MBA, New York University, 1977
BA, University of Cincinnati, 1974

Prior to joining the Sy Syms School of Business, Professor Joseph Kerstein worked at Baruch College, where he was the chairman of the Stan Ross Department of Accountancy from 2002 to 2005. He is a CPA in the state of New York.

Dr. Kerstein’s current teaching interests include taxation of both individuals and entities and financial accounting. His current research interests include articles on earnings management and earnings quality. Future research will consider the earnings and disclosure quality of anti-earnings management behavior and the relation between earnings management and aggressive tax planning as they affect book-tax differences.

He graduated magna cum laude and received a doctoral fellowship at the University of Pennsylvania. A New England Journal of Medicine article he authored was named article of the year by the Association for Health Services Research.

Professor Kerstein has been published in some of the top journals in his fields of accounting and healthcare economics, including The Accounting Review, Journal of Accounting and Economics, New England Journal of Medicine, Medical Care, and Health Services Research.

Alvin Einbender University Professor of Business Ethics
Professor of Accounting

PhD, NYU, Leonard Stern School of Business, 1990
BA, Brandeis University, 1981

Dr. Moses Pava is the former dean of the Sy Syms School of Business, the Alvin Einbender University Professor of Business Ethics, and Professor of Accounting. He has been teaching at Yeshiva University since 1998. A 1990 PhD graduate from NYU¹s Stern School of Business and a 1981 graduate from Brandeis University, Dr. Pava has written numerous books, including “Jewish Ethics In A Post-Madoff World,” “Business Ethics: A Jewish Perspective,” “Leading With Meaning,” “The Jewish Ethics Workbook,” “The Search for Meaning In Organizations,” and “Jewish Ethics As Dialogue.” He has authored scores of articles, including “Corporate Social Responsibility and Financial Performance,” one of the most cited articles in the field of corporate social responsibility. He serves on the editorial board of the Journal of Business Ethics and the Journal of Jewish Ethics. He lectures across the U.S. and around the world on Jewish business ethics, spirituality in business, and corporate accountability.

Associate Professor of Accounting

PhD, Baruch College, CUNY Graduate School, 2008
BA, Brooklyn College, 1998

Dr. Aliza Rotenstein is a clinical associate professor of accounting at the Sy Syms School of Business at Yeshiva University. She holds a BA from Brooklyn College and a PhD in business/accounting from the City University of New York Graduate Center.

Dr. Rotenstein teaches courses in both financial and managerial accounting. Her main research interests include corporate governance, accounting restatements, and earnings management. Some of her other research examines electronic tools used in accounting classes to find important implications for accounting students and educators. Her most recent research in the Journal of Accountancy discusses updated accounting standards issued by FASB.

Dr. Rotenstein has presented some of her research at the American Accounting Association annual meetings and at the Academy of Business Research International Conference. Her research has also appeared in the Journal of Accountancy, Journal of Accounting Education, Academy of Business Journal, Journal of Business Case Studies, and Journal of Applied Business Research.

Adjunct Professor

MBA and CPA

Having risen through the ranks of Ernst & Young during a 20-year career, Professor Rothenstein retired as an Executive Director of the company in 2015.

While at EY, she directed the firm’s accounting and auditing tools as well as authoring various publications produced by the firm to provide technical accounting guidance.

During her term at EY, she served concurrently as a Lecturer at Baruch College where she taught both graduate and undergraduate accounting and auditing classes. Since retiring from EY, Professor Rothenstein has taught classes in accounting and auditing at the Sy Syms School of Business of Yeshiva University. Other classes included Contemporary Accounting Topics and Advanced Auditing.

Prior to joining E&Y, she spent three years as an auditor at Deloitte Haskins and Sells, and then ten years in the accounting policy group at Chase Manhattan Bank. She has been a practicing CPA in New York State since 1981.

Jennifer Shin is a world-renowned data scientist, entrepreneur, and thought leader. She is the Founder of 8 Path Solutions, a data science, analytics, and technology company based in New York City.

Jennifer’s data science career spans a wide variety of disciplines, from planetary sciences to epidemiology. In 2021, she served as a subject matter expert at NASA as a member of the Planetary Data Ecosystem (PDE) Independent Review Board (IRB). She is also a reviewer of predictive models for the United Nations and a member of the UN Global Network of Chief Data Officers & Statisticians.

Prior to this, Jennifer has successfully implemented complex, large scale, multimillion dollar projects and developed data products, services, and technologies at Fortune 500 companies. As the inaugural product director for AdSmart Context at NBCUniversal, she transformed a concept into a new proprietary machine-learning AI technology platform, which became a monetized commercial success in the first year and received significant coverage by the press and media outlets.

Jennifer's expertise in data science, technology and business has been recognized by industry leaders, including IBM, MongoDB, and the South Korean government. Prior to joining the Sy Syms School of Business, Jennifer taught at Columbia University, New York University, University of California, Berkeley, and City University of New York. She received her undergraduate degrees in economics, mathematics and creative writing, and her graduate degree in statistics from Columbia University.

Outside of work, Jennifer also creates and consults on courses for LinkedIn Learning. She serves on several advisory boards and committees, including for the Grace Hopper Conference and the City University of New York.

Dean, Sy Syms School of Business

PhD, Graduate School of Business Administration, Harvard University, 2002
MA, Sociology, Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, Harvard University, 2001
MBA, Graduate School of Business Administration, Harvard University, 1999
BS, Finance/Strategy, Wharton School of Business, University of Pennsylvania, 1992
BSE, Engineering, Moore School of Engineering, University of Pennsylvania, 1992

Dean Noam Wasserman was an award-winning professor at Harvard Business School (HBS) and the founder of a center at the University of Southern California. He has written two bestselling and award-winning books, The Founder's Dilemmas and Life Is a Startup, and a dozen bestselling HBS case studies.

At Syms, he has focused on strengthening the undergraduate program by growing the tenure-track faculty 25 percent in his first year, focusing on teaching and research excellence, making significant enhancements to the Honors program, and adding a minor in Real Estate. He has also consolidated and scaled the graduate program, including launching an MS in Real Estate and founding post-graduation bootcamps for alumni and others. He leads the university-wide Presidential Task Force on Entrepreneurship and Innovation.