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Dispatches from the network and updates from the Foundation.
Dr. Nina Butler is an alumna of the Wexner Graduate Fellowship Program and can be reached at nbutler@avichaina.org. After spending 25 of the last 30 years working at the school next-door, the last seven as principal, she is now the national Educational Consultant to the AVI CHAI Foundation, commuting the 400 miles from Pittsburgh to Manhattan. Note: When Brigitte coaxed me into writing this D’var Torah, she could not have anticipated that
Aug 2007
Dafna Siegman is an alumna of the Wexner Graduate Fellowship Program, during which she pursued doctoral work in Jewish History at Columbia University. She served as Director of Curriculum Development for the Florence Melton Adult Mini-School Institute in Jerusalem and she teaches Tanach at Nishmat in Jerusalem. She can be reached at dafnasiegman@gmail.com Parashat Shemot recounts Moshe’s rise to leadership. After killing an Egyptian, Moshe fled to Midian. There he
August 8, 2007 Rabbi Sue Fendrick, an alumna of the Wexner Graduate Fellowship Program, is Senior Research Associate at the Mandel Center for Studies in Jewish Education at Brandeis University, a freelance editor and writer, and the granddaughter of Samuel Kitzes z”l. She lives with her family in Newton, MA. She can be reached at fendrick@brandeis.edu Some would say that my youngest children have too many names. The night before the
Rabbi Elie Kaunfer, an alumnus of the Wexner Graduate Fellowship, is executive director of Mechon Hadar: An Institute for Prayer, Personal Growth and Jewish Study (www.mechonhadar.org). This summer, Mechon Hadar launched a full-time yeshiva that offers men and women in their 20s an opportunity for traditional text study, egalitarian prayer and social action with a special focus on personal religious growth. He is a co-founder of Kehilat Hadar (www.kehilathadar.org), an
Jul 2007
Nina Gelfand Harris, M.A. LCSW, is a social worker in private practice specializing in adolescents and over the summer is the Camp Social Worker at Camp Ramah in Wisconsin. She is a member of the Chicago 06 Wexner Heritage Group. Nina can be reached at AHarris772@aol.com. I have been involved in Jewish communal work for as long as I can remember. To pay my bills in college and graduate school, I held
Dr. Eitan Homa, a San Francisco Wexner Heritage alumnus, enjoys shaking foundations of thought. He may be reached at ehoma@dermatologyoffice.com. It’s July 2007. If you want a great traditional dvar torah? Google Matot-Masei. Want something a little different. Keep reading. So, do you keep kosher? Oh, only in the home and on Passover you say. Why are we as a people so schizoid about this week’s parsha commandment of keeping
The Wexner Foundation Electronic Beit Midrash Parashat Pinchas Sefer Bamidbar: The Clash of Vision and Reality By Rabbi Fred Klein Fred Klein is an alumnus of the Wexner Graduate Fellowship Program, Class VI. He is the Director of Community Chaplaincy at the Greater Miami Jewish Federation, and the Executive Vice President of the Rabbinical Association of Greater Miami. He can be reached at RabbiKlein@gmjf.org. For millennia, philosophers have imagined what
Jun 2007
Marjory Kaplan is an alumna of the Wexner Heritage Program, San Diego 03. She is the, CEO of the Jewish Community Foundation in San Diego. Marjory can be reached at marjory@jcfsandiego.org. Books have always been my mentors. Reading Nickel and Dimed by Barbara Ehrenreich, I was horrified by the stories of people trying to survive on minimum wage in this country. Certainly we can all work to find systemic solutions
Evan Muney is a Wexner Heritage Alum from San Francisco where he serves on the Executive of the Federation’s Israel and Overseas Committee. He is also a partner in Camp Kimama, an international Jewish summer camp in Israel, where he will be spending this summer and promoting dialogue between Israeli and Diaspora Jews. He would be happy to have visitors. Contact him at evan@campkimama.org. Imagine an Israeli attorney and teacher
Yosef Israel Abramowitz, who blogs daily at www.Peoplehood.org, supported the candidacy of Einat Wilf for President of the World Jewish Congress. He is a member of Kol Dor and lives in the wilderness of the Arava. He can be reached at YosefA@aol.com. KIBBUTZ KETURA–In one of those biting and perhaps ironic alignments of Torah and public Jewish life, we read Parashat Korah as three contemporary rebellions came to a climax