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HUCNews is a weekly e-newsletter produced by HUC-JIR's National Public Affairs Office.
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Major General Sidney Shachnow to Receive President's Medallion at HUC-JIR/Cincinnati Graduation
Major General Sidney Shachnow will receive the President's Medallion from Rabbi David Ellenson at Graduation in Cincinnati on June 6. Shachnow is a Holocaust survivor, author, and former Commanding General of U.S. Army Special Forces Command. Please click here for the 2-part interview with Major General Shachnow: Part 1;
Part 2. More...
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Sacred Strategies: Transforming Synagogues from Functional to Visionary
HUC-JIR faculty have just published Sacred Strategies: Transforming Synagogues from Functional to Visionary about eight synagogues that reached out and helped people connect to Jewish life in a new way-congregations that had gone from commonplace to extraordinary. Over a period of two years, researchers Isa Aron (Professor of Jewish Education at HUC-JIR's Rhea Hirsch School of Education), Steven M. Cohen (Research Professor of Jewish Social Policy at HUC-JIR), Lawrence A. Hoffman (Barbara and Stephen Friedman Professor of Liturgy, Worship and Ritual at HUC-JIR), and Ari Y. Kelman (Assistant Professor of American Studies at the University of California, Davis) interviewed 175 synagogue leaders and a selection of congregants (ranging from intensely committed to largely inactive). They found these congregations shared six traits: sacred purpose, holistic ethos, participatory culture, meaningful engagement, innovation disposition, and reflective leadership and governance. The picture that emerges in this book is one of congregations that were entrepreneurial, experimental, and committed to "something better." More...
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Capstone Projects for 2010 Master of Arts in Religious Education Degree Recipients
The 2010 graduates of the New York School of Education presented Capstone Projects in completion of their Master of Arts in Religious Education degrees. Please click here to learn about their Capstone topics and find out what they are doing next year. More...
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Capstone Projects for 2010 Master of Arts in Jewish Education Degree Recipients
The 2010 graduates of the Rhea Hirsch School of Education presented Capstone Projects in completion of their Master of Arts in Jewish Education degrees. Please click here to learn about their Capstone topics and find out what they are doing next year. More...
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Jewish Communal Professionals of Southern California 30th Annual Awards Benefit - jcpsocal.org
The Jewish Communal Professionals of Southern California will host its 30th Annual Awards Benefit on June 9, 2010 at Sephardic Temple Tefereth Israel. Lori Klein, Assistant Director of the School of Jewish Communal Service at HUC-JIR/Los Angeles, is receiving the Bobbi Asimow Award for Professional Mentorship and Dan Rothblatt (HUC-JIR/Los Angeles '86), Senior Vice President at Jewish Community Foundation of Los Angeles, is receiving a special award. Click here to view the invitation. More...
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Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion Announces 2010 Ordination, Investiture, Graduate, and Honorary Degree Recipients
Rabbi David Ellenson, Ph.D., President of the Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion (HUC-JIR) has announced the class of 2010, who will be ordained, invested, and graduated this spring in Cincinnati, Los Angeles, and New York. Rabbi Ellenson said, "The Class of 2010 emerges from the College-Institute imbued with leadership skills, steeped in knowledge, strengthened by a commitment to service, and dedicated to bringing hope and healing to our troubled world. As they touch the lives of others through their sacred work as rabbis, cantors, educators, communal professionals, scholars, and pastoral care-givers throughout North America and around the world, they will be a source of inspiration and guidance." Click here to view the national invitation for event details. More...
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HUC-JIR/Cincinnati Graduation and Ordination Ceremonies 2010
Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion in Cincinnati will hold Ordination Ceremonies on Saturday, June 5, 2010 at 9 am and Graduation Ceremonies on Sunday, June 6, 2010 at 1 pm. Ordination Ceremonies will take place at Plum Street Temple (726 Plum Street, Cincinnati) and Graduation Ceremonies will take place at Isaac M. Wise Temple (8329 Ridge Road, Cincinnati). Rabbi David Ellenson, President of HUC-JIR, will present honorary degrees and awards to leading academic, communal, and civic leaders; award earned degrees to HUC-JIR's graduates; and ordain the Rabbinical Class of 2010. Click here to view the national invitation for event details. More...
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The Nelson Glueck School of Biblical Archaeology Lecture: June 24 at HUC-JIR/Jerusalem
Please join HUC-JIR/Jerusalem and The Nelson Glueck School of Biblical Archaeology as Yuval Gadot and Taufik Dea'dle presents "Lod from the Time of the Mamluk to the Ottoman Period: Results of a Community-Based Archaeological Project." The lecture, conducted in Hebrew, is designed to present the results of recent archaeological research to the general public in Israel. It will take place on June 24 at 5:00 pm at HUC-JIR/Jerusalem. Admission is free. The series is supported by the Fellner Foundation and its Trustee, Mr. Frederick L. Simmons of Los Angeles. More...
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Jerusalem Student Services
June 7 at 9 am: Drasha: Or Zohar; Shaliah Zibur: Galit Koen-Kedem More...
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Grace your doorway with this mezuzah by Judaic artist and photographer Judith Sirota Rosenthal. Carved from bamboo and embellished with gold and scarlet thread, this mezuzah will contribute a natural warmth to your home. $250 plus shipping and handling. To purchase, please contact: 212-824-2218, museumnyc@huc.edu.
Please click the icon to the left for a larger image.
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Jim Joseph Foundation Gives $33 Million To Improve Field of Jewish Education - The Jewish Daily Forward
Having awarded nearly a quarter of a billion dollars in just four years to Jewish education, the Jim Joseph Foundation seems determined to remake the field through the power of its cash. In May, the Jewish Theological Seminary, Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion, and Yeshiva University became the most recent recipients of the foundation's largess when the JJF issued a $33 million grant to the schools. The grant, which is to be divided equally among the three schools, aims "to increase the number and quality of Jewish educators in both traditional and experiential education," JJF declared in a statement announcing it. The San Francisco-based foundation ultimately expects more than 1,000 students to graduate with degrees in Jewish education from all three seminaries during the five-year grant period. More...
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Teachable Moment: The limits of a cross-denominational partnership aimed at helping Jewish educators - Tablet
Last week, each of the three universities associated with the major American Jewish denominations received an $11 million grant from the Jim Joseph Foundation [1], a San Francisco-based Jewish philanthropy. The grants to the Reform movement's Hebrew Union College [2], the Conservative movement's Jewish Theological Seminary [3], and the Modern Orthodox movement's Yeshiva University [4] are earmarked for their respective Masters programs in Jewish education-a priority at all three institutions thanks to the current emphasis on youth outreach across much of the organized Jewish world. There's only one catch: Each institution must use $1 million of its grant money on joint teacher-training endeavors with the other two schools. If that sounds like an obvious request, you probably don't remember the interdenominational Jewish politics of the recent past. During the 1980s and 1990s, the three major synagogue movements were widely perceived as being at loggerheads [5]. Movement leaders and observers seem to agree that, in the past decade or so, tensions between the denominations have eased-led in part by a warming of the relationships between the heads of HUC, JTS, and YU, all central institutions within their movements. More...
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Impacting Jewish Lives - Philanthropy News Digest
Al Levitt, President, Jim Joseph Foundation, writes: "The $33 million in gifts recently awarded by our foundation (which was in addition to a previously awarded $12 million in emergency grants to the same three seminaries mentioned above) represent our commitment to increasing the number of future educators and to improving the quality of professional preparation and Jewish education they receive. We care deeply about the future of Jewish life and believe in the unique role philanthropists can play in helping to ensure it. The new partnerships we are establishing should have a significant impact on the number of future Jewish educators and the skills they will bring to their professions. With the help of these grants, we know those institutions can reach their full potential and produce teachers who continue to positively shape the lives of Jewish youth. More importantly, we hope that our efforts to meet the challenges facing the Jewish community will encourage other philanthropies to see how large, targeted grants that enable grantee partners to build capacity and sustain funded initiatives can ultimately lead to transformative changes in education." More...
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Arie (Lova) Eliav Dies at 88 - The Jerusalem Post
Arie "Lova" Eliav (Lifshitz), one of the founders of the Labor Party and one of the last members of Israel's "greatest generation" of state-builders, died In Tel Aviv on Sunday at the age of 88. Eliav was a founding member of the HUC-JIR/Jerusalem Board of Overseers. He was both a prominent politician, serving in five Knessets as part of a number of left-wing factions, and a public figure known for his grassroots action - from smuggling into pre-state Palestine thousands of Jewish refugees to establishing the eastern Negev city of Arad. "Lova was an example for our nation of pioneering service," Welfare and Social Services Minister Isaac Herzog said. "In his social perspectives, in his understanding of the beauty of Israeli society as well as its complexities and of the need to bravely reach peace with our neighbors. His image and his beliefs will remain with us for generations." More...
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Cincinnati Jews at the White House Today - Cincinnati.com
Cincinnati was well represented at the first-ever Jewish American Heritage Month reception at the White House on Thursday. Four local residents were invited to the White House event, including Dr. Gary Zola, Professor of the American Jewish Experience at HUC-JIR and Executive Director of the Jacob Rader Marcus Center of the American Jewish Archives. According to Zola, Cincinnati's presence is fitting indeed. Cincinnati is one of the oldest Jewish communities in the country. "It would be hard to conceive of any accurate history of the American Jewish experience being told without a very significant discussion of Cincinnati," Zola said, noting that HUC-JIR is the oldest rabbinical seminary in continual existence in the world. "We were delighted and very surprised when we were informed that the president would like to hold a reception for Jewish American Heritage Month. We were just thrilled." More...
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Remarks by the President at Reception in Honor of Jewish American Heritage Month - The White House Office of the Press Secretary
Rabbi Alysa Stanton (HUC-JIR/Cincinnati '09), the first African American woman rabbi ordained at HUC-JIR, read Emma Lazarus' "The New Colossus" at a reception in honor of Jewish Heritage Month on May 27 at the White House, at which President Barack Obama said, "I am proud to welcome you to the first ever event held at the White House to honor Jewish American Heritage Month. The diversity of talents and accomplishments represented in this room underscores the vast contributions that Jewish Americans have made to this country. Jewish Americans have always been a critical part of the American story. Jewish communities have at times faced hardship and hostility - right here in the United States of America - a reminder that we have to respond at all times swiftly and firmly whenever bigotry rears its ugly head. But no matter what the obstacles, Jewish Americans have endured -- learning from each other, leaning on each other, true to their faith, leaning on the values that have been associated for so long with Jewish history: a sense of community, a sense of moral purpose, and an ethic of responsibility. Every person in this room stands at the end of an unbroken chain of perseverance -- of a conviction that a better future is possible -- that doesn't just offer a lesson to Jewish Americans. It offers a lesson to all Americans. And ultimately, that is what we are celebrating today." More...
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My Meeting at the White House - The Jerusalem Post
The President's Chief of Staff, Rahm Emanuel, requested a diverse group of rabbis be assembled to visit the White House to discuss the current status, perception, and truth about US-Israel relations. Rabbi Mark Strauss-Cohn (HUC-JIR/Cincinnati '98) was invited to participate. He said, "There wound up being two meetings in the West Wing between our group of fifteen American rabbis and senior administration officials. We came from various parts of the country and spanned the denominational spectrum. It was remarkable to me that rabbis from three different movements were meeting in the White House with four senior White House officials - all Jewish. What made our meetings so powerful and challenging was the fact that all parties were honest, frank, and open. ... Ultimately, I believe American Jews want to support Obama. There has been a lot of misinformation, some of which came up in our meeting. The administration knows that it needs to get perception to meet reality and it is working on that gap. Perhaps we were befriended for just that reason. But in order to learn the truth, I don't mind becoming friends. We can hope, pray, and continue to lobby as I had the great privilege and honor to do. I only hope that President Obama hears our voice and begins to speak and move more openly toward personally nurturing that relationship with Israel." More...
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This Week in History: First American Woman Rabbi - Jewish Women's Archive
Sally Priesand made history on June 3, 1972, when she was ordained by Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion (HUC-JIR), becoming the first female rabbi in American history and the first woman to be ordained by a rabbinical seminary. Priesand proved her doubters wrong. Upon graduation, she secured a post as assistant rabbi at the Stephen Wise Free Synagogue in Manhattan, considered one of the premier reform synagogues in the country, with some 750 families. She served that congregation, as assistant and associate rabbi, for seven years. More...
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Founded in 1875, Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion is the nation's oldest institution of
higher Jewish education and the academic, spiritual, and professional development center of Reform Judaism.
HUC-JIR educates men and women for service to American and world Jewry as rabbis, cantors, educators, and
communal service professionals and offers graduate and post-graduate degree programs for scholars of all faiths.
With campuses in Cincinnati, Los Angeles, New York, and Jerusalem, HUC-JIR's scholarly resources comprise
renowned library, and museum collections, the American Jewish Archives, biblical archaeology
excavations, research centers and institutes, and academic publications. HUC-JIR invites the community to an array
of cultural and educational programs that illuminate Jewish history, culture, and contemporary creativity, and
foster interfaith and multi-ethnic understanding.
Visit us at
www.huc.edu.
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