INSIDE BINGHAMTON UNIVERSITY
New faculty: 2007
Adina Ofek, visiting associate professor, Judaic Studies Department
Adina Ofek, a visiting associate professor of Hebrew in the Judaic Studies Department and undergraduate director of the Hebrew program, was born in Czechoslovakia but raised in Israel.
Ofek received her bachelor’s degree at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, her master’s in applied linguistics at Columbia University and her doctorate in Jewish education at the Jewish Theological Seminary of America.
Ofek taught at the Jewish Theological Seminary for 30 years. In addition to chairing the Hebrew department, developing language teaching materials and developing the mentor program, she created and directed the Gross Hebrew Language Institute, which serves day-school H
OFEK
Ofek was also the academic chair of the SAT II Modern Hebrew Education Language Exam for the Educational Testing Service and has served on its committee for the past 10 years. She is the editor of the Journal of Hebrew Higher Education of the National Association of Professors of Hebrew.
John H. Starks Jr., assistant professor, Classical and Near Eastern Studies
John H. Starks Jr., an assistant professor in Classical and Near Eastern Studies, is a Phi Beta Kappa graduate of Washington & Lee University. He received a doctorate from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, where his dissertation focused
STARKS
Starks’ research interests include Greek and Roman drama, ethnicity in the ancient Mediterranean world, Roman historiography and classical biography, Latin oratory, inscriptions and papyri.
He previously taught at Randolph-Macon Woman’s College, Agnes Scott College and UNC Greensboro.
At Binghamton, Starks is teaching several Latin courses, Classical Biography, Roman Historians on Celtic and German Ethnicity and Race and Ethnicity in Ancient North Africa.
Starks, 40, sings with the Binghamton University Chorus and the Madrigal Choir of Binghamton. He also enjoys camping, hiking, biking to work and cooking.
He and his wife, Kathy, have a son named Geoffrey and a daughter named Meredith.
