Top row left to right: Dr. Paul Winkler, Krissy Holak, Steve Marcus and Abby Bender. Bottom row left to right: Paul Axelrod, Maurice Axelrod and Susan Axelrod Aguato. The Richard Stockton College of New Jersey Holocaust Resource Center is pleased to announce the Honey and Maurice Axelrod 2008 Awards for Atlantic County.

The Honey and Maurice Axelrod Award recognizes outstanding educational and community leaders in New Jersey who lead the fight against bias, prejudice, and discrimination through education about the Holocaust and other genocides.

The award is a cooperative project of the Anti-Defamation League of New Jersey, the New Jersey Commission on Holocaust Education, and the Axelrod Family.

The three Atlantic County recipients of this year's Axelrod Awards are Abby Bender, Krissy Holak and Steve Marcus.

Abby Bender is a teacher at Atlantic City High School, where she developed a year-long course in Holocaust and Genocide Studies. Bender arranged for her students to visit the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in March, 2008.

She also has inspired her students to further their study about the Holocaust and other genocides.

Krissy Holak is a teacher at Hammonton Middle School. She has established a strong foundation in Hammonton's middle school curriculum for Holocaust and Genocide Studies. Under the direction of Holak, Hammonton Middle School began using ITV (interactive television from Stockton's TV studios) as a teaching tool for Holocaust survivor testimony and lectures about the history of the Holocaust. She headed a project to collect and send shoes for the children of Darfur.

Steve Marcus has devoted hundreds of hours to develop a year-long program of study about the Holocaust and other genocides at Egg Harbor Township High School. Marcus is always developing innovative approaches for teaching Holocaust and genocide studies at Egg Harbor Township High School. He is the advisor for S.T.A.N.D. (Students Taking Action Now Darfur) at Egg Harbor Township High School.