Rady School Dean’s Advisory Council Inducts Seven New Members, Effective July 1, 2025

Rolf Benirschke

Rolf Benirschke is a former NFL placekicker whose ten-year career was nearly derailed during his third season by a life-threatening battle with ulcerative colitis. He would require two emergency surgeries and spend two months in the hospital fighting for his life. After a remarkable comeback, he returned to play seven more seasons with the San Diego Chargers earning numerous honors including Walter Payton NFL Man of the Year, NFL Comeback Player of the Year, All-Pro, and became the twentieth player inducted into the Chargers Hall of Fame.

Following his NFL career, Rolf founded Legacy Health Strategies, a patient engagement company that amplifies the voice of patients to accelerate the development and delivery of new medicines, treatments, and devices and helped launch several biotech companies doing inflammatory bowel research. As a respected leader and speaker in the health care industry and a spokesperson for the Crohn’s and Colitis Foundation, he is a tireless advocate for IBD patients.

With a passion to improve the lives of ostomy patients, he founded his non-profit, Embracing Ostomy Life, to support and encourage everyone who undergoes this life changing surgery. He also sits on the board of the San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance, ViroMissile, SRT Therapeutics, and works closely with the founders of Prometheus Labs and Mirador Therapeutics. He has written four books including his autobiography, Alive & Kicking, and Saving Wildlife, the story of his father’s work in conservation at the San Diego Zoo. He is married and the father of four children, including three with special needs.

Robert H. Gleason

Robert H. Gleason was appointed President and CEO of Evans Hotels in 2014, becoming the first executive outside of the Evans family to run the day-to-day operations of the company. Mr. Gleason oversees and directs all aspects of business strategy and performance growth for Evans Hotels and its three iconic San Diego properties: The Lodge at Torrey Pines in La Jolla as well as the Bahia Resort Hotel and Catamaran Resort Hotel and Spa on Mission Bay. Prior to his appointment, Mr. Gleason spent the previous 15 years as the Chief Financial Officer and General Counsel of Evans Hotels. Having dedicated more than half of his life to the company, he first joined Evans Hotels as a reservations agent at the age of 17 and gradually worked his way up to CFO prior to earning his law degree.

Outside of his work, Mr. Gleason has also been active in organizations focused on arts and culture, civil rights, education, inclusive economic development, international trade, and electoral politics. He currently serves on the Executive Committee of the California Travel and Tourism Commission, which does business as Visit California, developing and maintaining marketing programs that keep California top-of-mind as a premier travel destination. In addition, he is Chair of the San Diego County Lodging Association, Director of the San Diego Tourism Marketing District, and Chair of the Arts Advisory Committee for San Diego International Airport. He serves on the Dean’s Advisory Council for the Rady School of Management at UC San Diego, the University of San Diego School of Law Board of Visitors, the Promises2Kids CEO Advisory Council, and American Cancer Society’s CEOs Against Cancer San Diego Chapter as well as the Advisory Board for the L. Robert Payne School of Hospitality & Tourism Management at San Diego State University, where he taught hospitality law and policy for many years.

In LGBTQ+ community work, Mr. Gleason is founder and supervising attorney of USD School of Law’s transgender and nonbinary name and gender-marker change legal clinic and Chair of the Patient and Family Advisory Council for Rady Children’s Hospital’s Center for Gender-Affirming Care. Previously, he served as Chair of the San Diego LGBT Community Center, Vice Chair of the LGBTQ Victory Fund, co-founder and Chair of the San Diego LGBT Community Leadership Council, founding Co-Chair of the Harvey Milk Diversity Breakfast, and Co-Chair of Princeton University’s Every Voice conference for LGBTQ+ alumni.

His volunteer work has been recognized with awards from Princeton University, San Diego County Bar Association, Tom Homann LGBT Law Association, San Diego Democrats for Equality, California Legislative LGBT Caucus, Equality California, Harvey Milk Foundation, San Diego Pride, and The Bishop’s School, among others. He has been included on the San Diego 500 List and named an LGBTQ+ Leader of Influence by San Diego Business Journal for many years.

Mr. Gleason graduated from The Bishop’s Schools as well as an A.B. in Economics from Princeton University as well as a J.D. summa cum laude from the University of San Diego School of Law. He is a licensed attorney and real estate broker in California as well as a Certified Hospitality Accountant Executive.

Victoria Sassine

Victoria Sassine, CPA, MBA, is a public board director, with over 25 years of expertise in scaling business growth and operations in a myriad of sectors. Throughout her executive career with Fortune 500 Companies ( Biogen, Philip Morris Companies, Kraft Foods, Shell Oil) her focus was on business transition, with an emphasis on developing leadership teams, and identifying market opportunities for growth. For the past fifteen years, Victoria has continued to propel shareholder value, by honing strategy and re imaging processes for both private and public firms.

Currently, Victoria serves as the Audit Committee Chair for Pantheon Private Equity Fund, a liquid alternative fund. Over a 36 month period, the fund experienced rapid growth, acquiring > $5 Billion AUM, with investments in primary, and secondary markets in a variety of industries. Additionally, she serves as a Director for Affiliated Management Group Funds( NYSE: AMG), an asset management complex. Victoria is also an independent Board Director for the PRG Group, a privately held general contractor and construction material provider. The firm specializes in luxury properties in Montana, Wyoming and Idaho.

Victoria has a BSBA in Accounting, and is a CPA. She earned her MBA from the Booth School at the University of Chicago. She is a rabid tennis fan and plays all racquet sports with enthusiasm, despite a limited skill level. She enjoys travel, and post pandemic, continues to explore Asia (where she grew up) and her adopted home state of CA.

Adam Wyll

Adam Wyll has served as the President and Chief Executive Officer of American Assets Trust, Inc. (NYSE: AAT) since January 2025. Previously at AAT, Mr. Wyll served as President and Chief Operating Officer from July 2021 to December 2024, as Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer from November 2019 to June 2021 and as Senior Vice President and General Counsel from AAT’s IPO in January 2011 until October 2019. Mr. Wyll oversees AAT’s day-to-day operational and corporate matters while driving strategic decision-making and growth initiatives. Additionally, Mr. Wyll has oversight of AAT’s transactions (including financings, acquisitions and dispositions), as well as AAT’s legal, information technology and human resources departments and ESG initiatives. Mr. Wyll previously worked as an attorney with a national law firm based in Dallas, Texas, where he specialized in representing institutional lenders in finance and real estate transactions, restructurings and other corporate matters. Mr. Wyll is a graduate from the University of Texas at Austin, School of Law; and he received his Bachelor of Business Administration/Finance degree with highest honors from the University of Texas at Austin, School of Business.

Eugene (Gene) Yeo

Eugene (Gene) Yeo, MBA ’08, PhD is the Sanford Stem Cell Institute Endowed Chair and Professor of Cellular and Molecular Medicine at the University of California San Diego, Director for UCSD’s Center for RNA Technologies and Therapeutics, Chief Scientist for Sanford Laboratories for Innovative Medicine and Director for the Sanford Stem Cell Institute’s Innovation Center. Dr. Yeo was trained as a computational biologist in machine learning/artificial intelligence during his PhD at MIT and then studied stem cell biology as a Crick-Jacobs fellow at the Salk Institute. His lab at UCSD has developed some of the most popular molecular and computational technologies to study how RNA processing is affected by RNA binding proteins in development and disease.

Gene has authored over 250 peer-reviewed publications (h-index of 100), is among the top 1% most highly cited scientists and received several prominent academic awards, including the Lee Kuan Yew Fellowship (2001), the Singapore National Research Foundation Visiting Investigatorship Award (2017), San Diego Xconomy Awardee for ‘Big Idea’ (2019), Paul Allen Distinguished Investigatorship (2020), the RNA Society’s Early Career Award (2017), the Elisa Izaurralde Award for Innovation in Research, Teaching and Service (2021) and the inaugural Academia Europaea Sydney Brenner Medal (2023).

Gene has founded several biotech companies and serves as scientific advisor to Red Tree Ventures, Proteona (acquired by Singleron), Trotana, EclipseBio, Orbital Therapeutics, Insitro, Automera, AmberBio, Radar Therapeutics and Atomic.AI. Gene is among the top 50 life science academic entrepreneurs by BIOS’ Beaker List and received the inaugural Entrepreneurial Achievement Award from the Rady School of Management (2023).

Matthew (Matt) Vokoun

Matthew (Matt) Vokoun is a Vice President at Google, where he leads the Strategy, Business Operations, Consumer Insights, and Data Science teams for the Platforms & Devices Product Area and also serves as the Site Lead for Google’s San Diego office. Prior to this, Matt was the integration and strategy lead for Google’s acquisition of Fitbit, as well as the Ecosystem and Privacy product management lead for Fitbit. Before that, Matt led the product management and business efforts for Google’s Pixelbook laptop product line.

Matt joined Google in 2009 on the Business Operations and Strategy team where he led strategy and operational improvement projects across the company, including growth strategies for Android, improving Google's global data center supply chain, and large product and organizational strategy efforts for Google’s hardware division, robotics efforts, and access initiatives. Matt was also heavily involved in Google’s acquisition of Motorola Mobility, where heled integration planning for the acquisition and was then a senior member of the subsidiary's management team as the VP of Strategy and the General Manager / VP of Product Management of the Companion Products business unit.

Matt attended the University of Wisconsin for his undergrad where he received his BS Chemical Engineering degree in 1998. He began his career in engineering roles at 3M, i2 Technologies, and Model E (an internet startup). He then attended MIT’s Leaders for Global Operations program where he received his MBA and MS Chemical Engineering degrees in 2005. After MIT and before Google, Matt worked at Bain & Company where he consulted with high tech and private equity clients throughout Silicon Valley. Matt relocated from Silicon Valley to San Diego in 2021 with his wife Reena and two sons Shaan and Ajay. Matt is very active in local youth sports for his sons, and he also serves on advisory boards at the University of Wisconsin, UC-San Diego, and Torrey Pines High School.

Alfred (Al) Zollar

Alfred (Al) Zollar, MA ‘76 has 45+ years of diverse business experiences, with the common thread being his involvement in a wide range of software technologies. His foundational experience was 34 years at IBM, primarily in IBM’s software business. Since retiring from IBM in 2011, Al has become a tech investor, private equity operator, as well as a board member at several public and private companies, including his current public company board roles at BNY, Nasdaq and IBM.

Following his Harvard Advanced Leadership Initiative Fellowship in 2011, Al has focused his social impact work on education, economic opportunity, and the performing arts. His educational non-profit board service includes The Eagle Academy Foundation, EL Education, as well as the foundation board of the University of California, San Diego, his alma mater. He is an avid supporter of programs that expand economic opportunities for underrepresented and marginalized communities. He is a long-time supporter of the performing arts, especially modern dance and jazz music.

Al graduated from UC San Diego with an MA in Applied Mathematics in 1976 and was an Advanced Leadership Initiative Fellow at Harvard University in 2011.