The Latest From The Foundation

Elise Bernhardt is President and CEO of The Foundation for Jewish Culture.  Elise can be reached at ebernhardt@JewishCulture.org. Sh’mini Atzeret, coming as it does on the day before Simchat Torah, is the point for me when the year really ends and begins anew. The transition is so physically marked: the unevenness of the Torah scrolls and then the rewind. The year begins in the same place and yet is fundamentally

Margy-Ruth Davis is Executive Director of the Aleph Society, Inc. mrdavis@steinsaltz.org  and Rachel Weiss-Berger, Project Director, Global Day of Jewish Learning (rachel@steinsaltz.org. Please visit www.1people1day.org to learn more. For a moment, imagine the Jewish people assembling at Mount Sinai. In the 21st century. It is difficult to imagine that all Jews would converge at the foot of a single mountain. Instead, there would more likely be congregations dispersed in locations

Fred Zeidman is an alumnus of the Wexner Heritage Program and a prominent Houston businessman.  He is chairman of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum.  Fred can be reached at fzeidman@xroadsllc.com. Everyone has a favorite permutation of the joke: A gathering of Jews produces more opinions than the number gathered.  (My favorite: The United States has one president and 300 million constituents; Israel has one constituent and 6 million prime

Reuven Avital is a Wexner Israel Fellowship alumnus who volunteers in several not-for-profits, including programs for students from weak backgrounds and from Ethiopian families and a home in the Negev for severely brain damaged patients.  He is a director in several medical device and pharmaceutical companies developing new technologies in Israel and the US.  He can be reached at avital3@014.net.il In April 2008, a Wexner alumni trip to Eastern Europe

Dinah Jacobs is the Academic Director of the Kellogg Management Education for Jewish Leaders (KJL). Formerly the Corporate Director of Customer Affairs at a global financial institution for 17 years, she is a recognized expert in building customer-centered organizations.  She and her husband regularly host Shabbat dinners at Kellogg where more than 100 students and faculty celebrate and learn together. She can be reached at dinah-jacobs@kellogg.northwestern.edu Rabbis report they spend

Galina Leytes and her husband Lev are Wexner Heritage alumni from the Bay Area. Galina is on the Board of the San Francisco Jewish Community Federation and Lev is on the boards of private and public foundations. They also provide management consulting to companies. They can be reached at galinal@generation-capital.com “This is a most creative and original approach to solve one of the key pressing issues of our times and

Rabbi Jay Moses, an alumnus of the Wexner Graduate Fellowship Program, is the Director of the Wexner Heritage Program.  He can be reached at jmoses@wexner.net Many of today’s Jewish leaders—including some of us on the staff of the Wexner Foundation—came of age in an era where the primary task of Jewish leadership in North America was clear: a couple million of our brothers and sisters were living under an oppressive

Rabbi Andy Koren, an alumnus of the Wexner Graduate Fellowship Program, is Assistant Rabbi and Director of Religious Education of Temple Emanuel in Greensboro, NC. He can be reached at AKoren@tegreensboro.org It hit me when I was on the phone with a high school senior. I was calling to recruit him for a Mitzvah- work trip to New Orleans. His response: “Definitely. I hear so many of my friends at

Joel Alperson, a Wexner Heritage alumnus, is the United Jewish Communities’ National Interfaith Campaign Chair and president of Omaha Fixture International in Omaha, NE. He can be reached at joel.alperson@omahafixture.com. So often, when I come across a Jew who has questions about Judaism or the Jewish community, my first instinct is to suggest a book. The problem is that the person I’m talking to has to remember my suggestion and

Jonathan Schreiber is an alumnus of the Wexner Graduate Fellowship Program. He can be reached at jonathanschreiber@sbcglobal.net I must be part zealot and part masochist. A few months ago, I was listening to a phone message telling me our daughter had just been accepted to one of the most difficult magnet schools to gain admittance to in the Los Angeles Unified School District – and we turned it down.. When