“It is both an honor and a dream to be recognized and inducted into the CHHS Hall of Fame. I always hoped to make something of my dream, which was to honor my heritage while making a positive difference in the world. I found my voice at CHHS, and it is wonderful to be able to share that my roots are from here, in Black and Gold country.”
As a Second-Generation Holocaust Survivor, Karen is dedicated to educating children and adults about taking responsibility for their actions, and encouraging them to rise up and take action in the face of human cruelty. Karen has taken her father’s inspirational story (a young Polish boy who spent time in the Krakow Ghetto, Sachsenhausen and Flossenburg concentration camps, Plaszow and Auschwitz death camps prior to a number to death marches to becoming the first cornetist, second trumpeter and the first personnel manager of The Cleveland Orchestra) to create Standupsters®, an international anti-bullying and Holocaust education program. Karen coined the term, defining it as “any human being who chooses to take a stand and use their sense of personal responsibility, and moral leadership, to take action to stop bullying and discrimination in today’s, school work and community environments.” To complement her school and community presentations (including CHHS), Karen created the website www.standupsters.com and a company, Can I Count on You, LLC, to make the material she teaches more accessible to educators, parents and students alike. Karen presents nationally and internationally and is the author of I am a Standupster and Trauma Filters Through. In her spare time, Karen, a devoted wife and mother of two children with special needs, is a senior sales director with May Kay Cosmetics who has earned 17 career cars (pink Cadillacs!) over 29 years with the company.
BEd, Bowling Green State University
Educator, Entrepreneur, Small Business Owner, Keynote Speaker, Author
Achievements
Invited to speak in both Warsaw, Poland and in Berlin, Germany to the Educational Consulate
Involved in getting the Holocaust and Genocide Bill passed into Colorado Law, HB20-1336, which requires teachers to utilize curriculum to teach about The Holocaust and Genocide Statewide, and asked to assist in the development of the Standards used by the Colorado Department of Education in designing quality resources for curriculum used by the teachers and students State-wide
Published 3rd book, How to Create Peace: Teaching Children How to Navigate Their Personal Choices, Build Their Character and Social Morality
Finalist, two years consecutively, for The Unsung Heroine Award in Jefferson County International Women’s Day for work with education through her Standupsters programs.
Award of Distinction from both the Colorado Cross Disability Coalition and The Colorado Autism Society for her work in advocacy
Invited Holocaust speaker to the military brass at Cheyenne Mountain’s Norad facility, to the Peterson Air Force Base military personnel, and to Ft. Carson in Colorado Springs