Prof. Chayim Herskowitz Wins 2016 Distinguished Teaching Award

The accounting professor has been said to be a "dynamic, engaging, stimulating" instructor.

June 05, 2016
Prof. Chayim Herskowitz

The award was voted on by both students and faculty from a group of four finalists, chosen by members of the LCM Distinguished Teaching Awards Committee. Chairperson Professor Matthew Zarnowiecki said that “the award candidates overall were found to be an impressive and dedicated group of teachers.”

Upon being told that he received the award, Prof. Herskowitz said he was honored.

“As a teacher, my goal has always been to connect with my students, to be an influential role model and to encourage their personal growth. It is a great honor to be commended through the 2016 Distinguished Teaching Award. It is a privilege to be appreciated, especially for doing something that I so love to do.”

Professor Herskowitz, CPA received both his Bachelors and Masters Degrees from Touro—the former at the Lander College of Arts and Sciences and the latter at Touro’s Graduate School of Business (where he delivered the 2015 commencement address last year), and began teaching at Touro in 2007.

“Besides for thanking the administration and my colleagues for their role in awarding me this honor, I especially want to thank my students,” he added. “This award is theirs as much as mine; teaching and learning are what we accomplish together. I hope this honor gives me renewed energy for this great calling and provides all professors the renewed confidence that good teaching is indeed valued and that what we do, even when it sometimes flies beneath the radar, matters a great deal.”

Graduating senior and accounting major Yaakov Burack, LCM ‘16, praised Professor Herskowitz for his “passion for the subject.”  He and fellow accounting major Dani Strauss recall an experience in which the duo were studying late in the library, the evening before the accounting final, when Professor Herskowitz came in to check up on his students and see if they needed any questions answered. “He cares a lot about his students,” says Strauss.

In addition to teaching, Professor Herskowitz writes simulation problems for the AICPA CPA Examination as part of the Simulation Development Group.

“Prof. Herskowitz brings extensive real-world accounting experience to the classroom, raising his students to the superior levels of knowledge and professionalism expected in the country’s leading accounting firms,” said Dean Moshe Sokol. “He is an outstanding instructor—dynamic, engaging, stimulating, deeply knowledgeable and rigorous.”