JW Magazine Fall 2016 by Jewish Women International

Fall 2016

LAURA REBELL GROSS, empowering at-risk girls through education

ITâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;S TIME TO

#VoteLikeAGirl MAKING THE

Tech Industry

FEMALE-FRIENDLY

Women to Watch

Vegetables

TAKE CENTER STAGE COPING WITH THE HEARTBREAK OF

Infertility

$5.99 jwmag.org

a publication of JWI

tickets and sponsorship at jwi.org/wtw

Don't miss the 16th annual celebration of extraordinary Jewish women and their achievements!

monday, december 12, 2016 at the Washington Marriott Wardman Park

the

FALL 2016

CHAIR'S MESSAGE

6 HAPPY CHALLAH DAYS Gifts inspired by everyone's favorite loaf. 11

WOMEN TO WATCH

This year’s Women to Watch share a drive for making a difference.

BY SUSAN JOSEPHS

22 SAVING YOUR LIFE

College students aren't planning for their financial futures... but they should be.

BY LAUREN LANDAU

25 VOTE LIKE A GIRL

Single women comprise America's most influential voting bloc. Learn what JWI is doing to encourage every woman to use her voice in the voting booth this November.

BY LAUREN LANDAU

29 DEBUGGING AN INDUSTRY

Activists are working to transform the tech field into a friendlier space for women.

BY ELICIA BROWN

34 WHEN THE HEART BREAKS

While religion may fail to comfort a woman facing infertility and loss, Jewish spirit can still buttress a broken heart.

BY DANIELLE CANTOR

36 RESUMÉS & RELATIONSHIPS

See what's growing as JWI's Young Women's Leadership Network expands westward.

39 AMPLIFYING THE CALL FOR PAID SAFE DAYS

Domestic Violence Awareness Month is the perfect time to promote workplace policies that give abused employees paid time off to secure protection.

BY ILANA FLEMMING

JW Magazine | jwi.org/magazine

Volume 20 EDITOR

Susan Tomchin CREATIVE DIRECTOR

Danielle Cantor COMMUNICATIONS MANAGER

Lauren Landau CEO

Loribeth Weinstein VP, MARKETING & COMMUNICATIONS

Meredith Jacobs Vivian Bass, Chair Ellen Stone, Vice Chair Kim Oster-Holstein, Immediate Past Chair

BOARD OF TRUSTEES Tami Ackerman Meryl Frank Robyn Altman Toby Graff Miri Cypers Erica Leatham Nicole Feld Diane Radin Susan Feldman Rabbi Susan Shankman

Deena Silver Julie Bender Silver Beth Sloan Susan W. Turnbull Suzi Weiss-Fischmann

JW is published by JWI – annually in print and year-round online. Inspired by our legacy of progressive women’s leadership and guided by our Jewish values, JWI works to ensure that all women and girls thrive in healthy relationships, control their financial futures and realize the full potential of their personal strength. JW magazine is distributed to donors and supporters of JWI and is available for purchase at $5.99 per issue. Postmaster: Please send address changes and inquiries to JW, 1129 20th Street NW, Suite 801, Washington, DC 20036.

Connect with JW and JWI: jwi.org/magazine JWI JewishWomenIntl 1129 20th Street NW, Suite 801 Washington, DC 20036 800 343 2823 • jwi.org

© Contents JWI 2016. The articles and opinions expressed herein do not necessarily represent the view of JWI or any member thereof. Advertising in JW does not necessarily imply editorial endorsement or guarantee kashrut of products.

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50 WHERE THE VEGETABLES ARE THE STARS In the hands of inventive chefs, homely vegetables go from simple sides to sophisticated centers of the plate.

40 SIGNED, SEALED AND DELIVERED

BY JAYNE COHEN

Bringing a letter to a gun fight could help close legal loopholes that put firearms in abusers' hands.

60 RUNNING AWAY FROM TO-DO LISTS

42 MY BELOVED'S AND MINE

Creating a wedding that sets the tone for a marraige. photo by StaciValentine

BY RAHEL MUSLEAH

47 HONORABLE MENTSCHEN

In her first novel for adults, Gayle Forman cuts to the heart of working moms' struggles. BY SANDEE BRAWARSKY

62 WOMEN WORTH KNOWING

The women in these books – real and fictional – seek understanding and self-realization on journeys that take us in fascinating directions.

A tribute to some of the wonderful allies working with us to end violence against women.

49 LEADERSHIP UPDATE

An epidemic of uncivil discourse is taking over our national dialogue. Can we break the cycle?

Who's stepping up, stepping down, and moving on from the JWI board of trustees.

BY SUE TOMCHIN

64 ANGRY WORDS

BY DAVID M. ROSENBERG

JW Magazine | jwi.org/magazine

Learn what JWI is doing to encourage voting this fall! You'll find interactive resources to get you election-ready at

JW Magazine | jwi.org/magazine

Vivian G. Bass Chair, JWI Board of Trustees

The New Year is nearly here, and with it comes the inevitable soul-searching questions. Did we treat others fairly and thoughtfully? Did we make nourishing connections with the people around us? Did we live fully and optimistically, realizing our potential? Did we speak out for the issues we care about? What better inspiration for realizing our potential and our power as women than reading in this issue about the 2016 JWI Women to Watch. These are stellar women whose drive for making a difference is impacting such fields as health care, education, politics, religion and philanthropy. They recognize that being a leader requires staying true to your values and not being afraid to step out boldly when we see something that needs doing. I’m looking forward to meeting and hearing from them on December 12 at the Women to Watch luncheon and the thought-provoking “Up Close and Personal” symposium that precedes it. This is an event that women in Washington, D.C. love coming to because they always leave feeling empowered! Nine years ago, I received a call inviting me to become a JWI Woman to Watch. Up to that point I had only heard of JWI in passing. However when I attended the luncheon and began to learn more, my commitment started to grow. I never would have predicted how that day would lead to the honor of serving as chair of the JWI Board of Trustees. I've always believed in advocating for individuals so they are able to live up to their potential. That was the focus of my professional life for 30 years, 21 of them as CEO, at Jewish Foundation for Group Homes. Now I’m fortunate that my

involvement with JWI has given me the opportunity to see from the inside how this organization goes about its amazing work benefitting women and girls at every stage of their lives: The traumatized little girl who hurriedly leaves her home and can’t bring her favorite book with her, but finds a copy to curl up with at a JWI library; the mother living at a shelter, struggling to put her life back together, who receives a bouquet of flowers from JWI on Mother’s Day and is inspired to face the future with hope; the sorority member on campus, worried about staying safe when she goes out, who finds guidance at a Safe Smart Dating program; the young woman in her first professional job in the Big Apple who finds friends, professional skills and financial know-how in the Young Women’s Leadership Network. And the woman who is able to walk confidently into retirement knowing that she understands her finances thanks to JWI’s financial literacy program for women over 50. When you read about our work in this magazine, I am confident that you will understand why I am committed to JWI and its mission of safe homes, healthy relationships, strong women. Rosh Hashanah is late this year beginning the evening of October 2. Election Day is only five weeks beyond that—on November 8. JWI has made a commitment to urge young women to go to the polls on Election Day, and has launched Vote Like a Girl, a nonpartisan educational campaign to spur this effort. If you know a young woman who has reached voting age in the last few years, send her to jwi.org – and urge her to vote! May the year 5777 be a good year for us all! JW Magazine | jwi.org/magazine

h ap p y

challah day s ! hat most special of breads, the beautiful challah, is remarkably simple, made of just flour, eggs, water, yeast, sugar and salt. Lovingly braided by generations of Jewish women, it has graced our Shabbat and holiday tables for centuries. With each careful twist, we weave our blessings for our families. And, at the time of the High Holidays, the loaves are extra sweet and shaped as a circle â&#x20AC;&#x201C; baked with the promise for a good year. Something this precious deserves its own accessories. Here are a few we can't resist. 6

JW Magazine | jwi.org/magazine

tray chic Clockwise from top left: ROUND POMEGRANATE CHALLAH BOARD AND SERVING PLATTER ($45) from Judaica Home Decor; handmade out of tempered glass featuring art by Marsha Anderson. etsy.com/shop/judaicahomedecor METALACE TRAY ($136), created by Israeli artist Talila Abraham combines delicacy and durability. metalaceart.com CHALLAH BOARD MADE OF GRANITE, PORCELAIN AND ALUMINUM ($290) by CaesareaArts, available in several color combinations. Knife sold separately. etsy.com/shop/CaesareaArts GEOMETRIC CHALLAH BOARD ($72) from New Yorkâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Jewish Museum shop is handmade in Brooklyn from maple wood. shop.thejewishmuseum.org

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under cover Challah covers, clockwise from top left: SHABBAT DREAMING CHALLAH COVER ($40) by Design Kippah is handmade of cotton with golden thread embroidery. Pattern is derivative of a complex painting by Aboriginal artist Peter Marshall; 15.5" x 19.5". etsy.com/shop/DesignKippah BRIGHT SPIRAL MEDLEY EMBROIDERED CHALLAH COVER ($34) from Kolbo Fine Judaica features pomegranates in its lively design; 16" x 20". kolbo.com SILKSCREENED CHALLAH COVER ($72) by Lois Gaylord is hand-dyed on linen with gold ink; 16" x 24". etsy.com/shop/LoisGaylord CHALLAH INFINITY SCARF KNITTING PATTERN ($7) by Pam Power Knits is an instant download. etsy.com/shop/PamPowersKnits

JW Magazine | jwi.org/magazine

DRESDEN PLATE QUILTED CHALLAH COVER ($54) by All Yadayim is handmade of cotton fabric by Debi Mishael; 19" square. etsy.com/shop/AllYadayim

eat it up SPIRITUAL KNEADING (Shamashi Press; $24.95) is an evocative collection of recipes, meditations, Jewish spiritual insights and Torah study from Dahlia Abraham-Klein. amazon.com BAGEL SPICE ($5.99) gourmet spice blends add zing to your homemade challah. bagelspice.com

GLUTEN-FREE CHALLAH ($16.99) from Challah Connection; cello pack includes two small six-ounce loaves. 866-CHALLAH or challahconnection.com "HAPPY CHALLAH DAYS" SPREADER ($18) by Thirty Six Design; hand-stamped vintage silverware, each one unique. etsy.com/shop/ThirtySixDesign

JW Magazine | jwi.org/magazine

Making special moments extraordinaryâ&#x20AC;Ś

palaceflorists.com

JW Magazine | jwi.org/magazine

1 O WO M E N TO WATC H

THIS YEARâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;S WOMEN TO WATCH SHARE A DRIVE FOR MAKING A DIFFERENCE.

BY SUSAN JOSEPHS

JW Magazine | jwi.org/magazine

nicky goren

Inspired to pursue a career in public service, Goren went on to assume multiple leadership roles in government and grantmaking institutions. Today, she channels her passion for effecting social change through the Meyer Foundation, which awards millions of dollars annually to over 150 organizations serving the Washington, D.C. region. Since becoming the Foundation’s president and CEO two years ago, the 50-year-old, Washington D.C-based philanthropic leader has been fiercely dedicated to fighting poverty, homelessness and educational and workforce inequality in her own community. “All of these issues are interrelated and you can’t address one without the other,” she says of the Foundation’s new strategic plan that “goes beyond individual grantmaking” and promotes systemic solutions to building wealth in low-income neighborhoods. A collaborative leader “with an open-door policy,” Goren spends her days creating partnerships with organizations and businesses, meeting with and building “a culture of transparency and trust” with her staff, and continuing to work toward finding solutions for the issues in her own backyard, including those related to poverty, race and ethnicity. “The work can be daunting, but it’s also exciting and I believe in our mission,” she says. Born to a father from Israel and an Egyptian mother of Ashkenazi background, Goren grew up in California and England and always felt “culturally Jewish.” Educated in French-speaking schools, she loved team sports and found a formative role model in her maternal grandmother, who moved to California in the 1950s as a single mother. “She did whatever it took to make ends meet and there was never a person she turned away for a meal,” she recalls. 12

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At Brandeis University, Goren played competitive volleyball, designed her own European cultural studies major and minored in legal studies, which propelled her to Cornell Law School. Initially unsure of her career path, she found a mentor in one of the law school’s deans, who “said I should find work where I’m intellectually challenged, making a difference and loving the people I work with,” she recalls. “This advice has guided every decision I’ve made.” Intent on working for the government, Goren served as assistant general counsel in the Congressional Budget Office and as counsel for the Office of Compliance of the U.S. Congress. She then landed at the Corporation for National and Community Service, where she eventually was promoted to acting CEO. Armed with valuable leadership skills, she transitioned into nonprofit management and spent four years as CEO of the Washington Area Women’s Foundation. “Being a CEO was never on my radar but I always looked for opportunities to stretch myself, “she observes. Married to Andrew Cohen and the mother of Jacob, 16, and Jared, 13, Goren has mentored participants of Brandeis University’s Eli J. Segal Citizenship Leadership Program, is an active member of Temple Micah and sits on the boards of multiple Washington, D.C.-based organizations, including Trinity Washington University and the Washington Regional Association of Grantmakers. “My goal has always been to make a difference in the world,” she says, “and to see my children become good citizens of that world.” 

"my goal has always been to make a difference in the world, and to see my children become good citizens."

photo by Lisa Helfert

As a college student, Nicky Goren took a life-changing road trip to West Virginia, where she came face-to-face with “the most abject poverty I had ever seen. People at my school were creating these shantytowns to protest apartheid in South Africa but here was a real shantytown with no running water and shacks of corrugated iron,” she recalls. “That was the beginning for me, seeing how much needed to be done in my own backyard.”

laura rebell gross Several years into her career as a New York City high school English teacher, Laura Rebell Gross secured an informational interview with The Young Women’s Leadership School in East Harlem. As she walked through the groundbreaking all-girls public school, founded to help low-income students achieve college-bound success, she became deeply inspired by the sight of “all these girls in their uniforms. They seemed so excited about their school and right then and there I asked the principal for a job,” she recalls. Gross eventually became the chair of the school’s English department and co-founded an affiliate charter school for girls in Rochester, N.Y. Today, she plays a crucial role in the school’s parent organization, the Young Women’s Leadership Network. As YWLN’s managing director of girls’ education, she oversees the development of new and existing schools, known as TYWLS, which include five in New York City and 13 affiliates located across the country. A fierce advocate for all-girls education, Gross also collaborates with officials from the New York City Department of Education and other agencies on initiatives that support the educational empowerment of girls in underserved communities. “YWLN represents everything I care about in education,” says Gross, whose 2012 Tedx talk on “Educating the Whole Girl” can be found on YouTube. “We are disrupting the cycle of poverty for our students, leading them instead on a path to college graduation and career attainment.” Crediting her leadership skills to 12 years as a classroom teacher and “not being easily rattled by the bumps in the

"it is the most gratifying work in the world to see girls excited about what they’re learning."

road,” the 44-year-old, Brooklyn, N.Y.-based educator spends her days leading professional development trainings for school principals and overseeing such TYWLS programs as “Cool Women, Hot Jobs,” where speakers share career success stories with students. Married to Jonathan Gross and the mother of Hannah, 12, Julia, 9, and Maddie, 8, she sometimes has to “arrange doctors’ appointments at the office and answer work texts during dinner. But I feel so passionately about my work and I want my daughters to know that they too can follow their passions,” she observes. Raised in Westchester, N.Y., Gross grew up with a strong Jewish identity and found powerful role models in her father, an attorney who fights for the rights of disenfranchised children in public schools, and her mother, a market researcher “who showed me how to have a career and a family. My parents were like-minded about making a contribution in the world,” she says. At Tufts University, Gross majored in English and women’s studies and discovered her gift for teaching when she substitute-taught a class for one of her professors. “I could see how excited the students were by what we were talking about and I thought, ‘that’s what I want to do with my life,’’’ she recalls. Initially aspiring to become a college professor, Gross changed her mind after a “life-changing experience” working with teenagers in New York City public schools through the arts education organization LeAP. “I realized this was the age group I was meant to work with,” she says, and received a Masters of Teaching degree from Brown University and became a high school teacher. Fueled by a passion “to give back,” Gross currently serves on the boards of her local synagogue Congregation Beth Elohim and the Riley Sandler Memorial Foundation, which promotes empathy among children, particularly girls. “No matter what I do, education is my lifetime commitment,” she says. “It is the most gratifying work in the world to see girls excited about what they’re learning.” 

JW Magazine | jwi.org/magazine

dr. leah greenspan hodor Dr. Leah Greenspan Hodor doesn’t know where her inner drive to help infants in Africa comes from. She just knows she has to make a difference. “Anytime you save a baby it’s a beautiful thing,” she says. Three and a half years ago she travelled to Uganda to work in a rural clinic. The families she encountered lived simply and worked hard, but often didn’t have money available for health care, putting the lives of newborns at risk. That trip helped the 49-year-old Bethesda, Md.-based neonatologist define how she could best use her skills to help. Greenspan Hodor subsequently co-founded Vital Health Africa (VHA), an organization dedicated to lowering neonatal mortality in the developing world. On VHA’s missions to Uganda, Rwanda, Ghana and Haiti, she has trained scores of doctors, nurses and midwives in techniques to save newborn babies in peril. “A large percentage of neonatal mortality is preventable if you have the proper training,” she says, adding, “And when you save one baby, you’re not only saving that baby’s life but potential generations.” When she’s not traveling abroad or developing VHA’s medical and educational initiatives with her co-founder Janis Simon, Greenspan Hodor works 16-hour shifts in the NICU (Neonatal Intensive Care Unit) at two community hospitals in the Washington, D.C. area. She recognized a long time ago that she doesn’t “have to do what everyone else is doing,” choosing to work part-time so she has the freedom to go to Africa five times a year. “I am gone 10 weeks a year developing the project,” she says. Greenspan Hodor grew up in Davie, Fla., where her New York-born parents had purchased a farm. Though farming wasn’t the family business (her father had a manufacturing company), she helped care for their animals and showed horses competitively. Anti-Semitism punctuated her growing-up years. “There were Klu Klux Klan meetings down the street from us and neighbors wouldn’t let me come over to play with their 14

JW Magazine | jwi.org/magazine

kids because I was Jewish,” she recalls. “But I always had a strong Jewish identity.” Though she excelled in the sciences, Greenspan Hodor struggled to find a career path. Taking a break from college to work as a graphic artist in her dad’s business, she found a mentor in a nutritionist whom she befriended. “She took me under her wing and believed in me,” she says, of the relationship that inspired her to study Nutrition and Dietetics at Florida International University. She received further encouragement from a professor whom, she recalls, “told me that with all my questions and interests I should think about medical school.” Greenspan Hodor spent three years at Stony Brook University Hospital in New York working as a Registered Dietitian specializing in Pediatric HIV/AIDS. That was where she first grasped the global impact of the disease. These experiences inspired her to go to medical school so she would be prepared to pursue her dream to provide health care for children in Africa. While studying medicine at Nova Southeastern University in Florida, she juggled her classes with spending time with her father, who died from pancreatic cancer during her second year. Married to Dr. Jonathan Hodor, a perinatologist, Greenspan Hodor loves traveling to Africa with her daughters, now ages 13 and 7, through VHA missions and in her capacity as a board member of the Nyaka AIDS Orphans Project. “I want them to understand the importance of doing for others,” she says of her children and the young volunteers that travel with her. “I also want my daughters to understand that being passionate about something and working hard is fulfilling and gives your life meaning.” 

"when you save one baby... you’re saving potential generations."

rabbi lauren holtzblatt Rabbi Lauren Holtzblatt will never forget the summer after her first year of rabbinical school, when she served as a chaplain at NYU’s hospital. Called in one night to minister to a dying patient, “I was beyond terrified and when I got there, he had already died,” she recalls. “It was only me and his family and I thought to myself, ‘I need to hold these people’s hands and be present for them.’” Convinced from that night on that she had chosen the right career path, Holtzblatt also became deeply committed to making Judaism relevant to 21st century Jews. Named one of “America’s Most Inspiring Rabbis” in 2016 by The Forward, the 39-year-old spiritual leader has spent the past five years creating groundbreaking programs and services that draw thousands of people to Adas Israel Congregation, Washington D.C.’s largest Conservative synagogue. Passionate about “giving people real tools to be their best selves,” she currently spearheads the Jewish Mindfulness Center of Washington, which repeatedly has been listed in the Slingshot Guide to top innovative Jewish organizations, the Jewish learning center MakomDC and the musically inspired “Return Again” services. Versed at teaching Torah as well as meditation, Holtzblatt recently co-wrote an essay about the women of Passover with Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg and credits her success “to being the same person on the bimah as I am walking down the street.” “Being a regular human being is very important to my rabbinate,” she says. “More than a healer or a teacher, I see myself as a witness to other people’s lives.”

"it had always felt Jewish to me, this idea that when you come from a place of privilege, you give back."

Raised in Port Washington, N.Y., Holtzblatt grew up culturally Jewish and credits her politically active parents for instilling her with a “deep sense of social justice.” Through her local synagogue, she participated in handing out food and clothing to the homeless and “it had always felt Jewish to me, this idea that when you come from a place of privilege, you give back,” she says. At Sarah Lawrence College, Holtzblatt “fell in love” with the Bible after enrolling in a biblical literature class. She spent her junior year at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem and completed advanced Torah study programs in Israel and New York before deciding to attend rabbinical school at the Jewish Theological Seminary. Living in New York City, she found important mentors in the rabbis at Congregation B’nai Jeshurun (BJ), where she completed a two-year rabbinic fellowship. “BJ was a place where I saw how Jewish learning and teaching could have a real impact on the world,” she observes. Inspired by BJ’s focus on soulful, musical services and social justice, Holtzblatt served as an associate rabbi at the Yale University Hillel and became the Hillel Foundation Director of Campus Initiatives, where she promoted “dialogues of civility” on college campuses. “I discovered that what I really love is working within a community and my encounters with individuals,” she says of finally landing at Adas Israel. Married to Ari Holtzblatt and the mother of Noa, 8, and Elijah, 5, Holtzblatt works “almost full-time” so she can pick up her kids from school and “give them the same presence that I bring to my work.” She also serves on the board of Avodah: The Jewish Service Corps and on the educational committee of her daughter’s school, the Jewish Primary Day School of Greater Washington. “What feels most important to me is helping Judaism continue to shed its light on this world,” she says. “I always want to be part of that conversation.”  JW Magazine | jwi.org/magazine

dana marlowe A lifelong “champion of the underdog” with a gift for advocacy and social entrepreneurship, Marlowe runs both a multi-million dollar IT consulting firm and rapidly expanding nonprofit from her home in Silver Spring, Md. As the founder of “Accessibility Partners,” she assists businesses and organizations, including the Library of Congress, Amazon and the Kennedy Center, with making their products and services accessible to those with disabilities. And since launching “Support the Girls” last July, she has transformed an idea to donate her unused bras into an international initiative. So far, Marlowe’s organization has collected over 20,000 bras and 53,000 tampons and menstrual pads for over 50 homeless shelters nationwide while “Support the Girls” affiliates have sprung up in other countries including Australia and Costa Rica. “It’s been life-changing,” says the 39-year-old activist of receiving feedback from homeless women who “don’t have to worry about getting their period on the street or who can stand up straight because they have a bra that fits. I personally have never been homeless but it was instilled in me that if you see a problem, you try and fix it.” Often starting her day at five in the morning to get her sons Micah, 8, and Riley, 4, ready for school, Marlowe sometimes resorts to “doing meetings on the driveway” in her car as she juggles her responsibilities as a working mom. “But my kids know that I’m passionate about what I do, which is trying to make the world a more accessible place for everyone,” she observes. Raised in New York’s Rockland County, Marlowe spent much of her childhood in “the hospital” with her father, 16

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who suffered from brain cancer and died when she was 12. “I got comfortable being around the sick and dying and seeing everyone as equals,” she recalls. Instilled with Jewish values about “being a mensch” from her parents, Marlowe also found a formative role model in her aunt, a speech pathologist who taught her sign language. Inspired to earn an associate’s degree in Sign Language Interpretation and Translation from Rochester Institute of Technology, she worked as a sign language interpreter while earning an additional communications degree from RIT. “I loved signing but I wanted to express my own ideas,” she says of continuing her education, which includes a master’s degree in interpersonal and organizational communication at the University of Texas’s Austin campus. After graduate school, Marlowe worked for an environmental nonprofit before relocating to Silver Spring, where she found her calling in information technology accessibility. After serving in senior positions for two IT accessibility firms, she crafted a business plan for her own company while on maternity leave during the 2009 recession. “I took a risk but I don’t quit easily if something is the right course of action,” she says of her success. Married to Preston Blay, Marlowe recently chaired a task force on engaging interfaith families through her local Jewish Federation and serves in leadership roles for several disability rights organizations. “I’m about human rights,” she says of all her endeavors. “And when there’s an opportunity to make a difference I will always step up.” 

"I personally have never been homeless but it was instilled in me that if you see a problem, you try and fix it."

photo by Emily Goodstein Photography

By day, Dana Marlowe works tirelessly to ensure that people with disabilities can access websites and effectively use their smartphones. By night, she’s often awake until two in the morning coordinating a global effort to provide bras and sanitary supplies to homeless women. Always, “I try to impact the positive well being of others,” she says.

rachel braun scherl Rachel Braun Scherl once had 13 meetings in two days where she tried to convince rooms full of male venture capitalists in Silicon Valley to fund Semprae Laboratories, Inc., whose lead product was Zestra Essential Arousal Oils, a product promoting female sexuality. “We had three strikes against us. We were women not only asking for money but running a company and talking about vaginas,” she recalls of acquiring the Zestra brand in 2008 and co-founding the company Semprae Laboratories. With her business partner Mary Wallace Jaensch, Scherl persisted in raising $21 million for Semprae, drew national attention to Zestra by launching a media campaign critiquing sexist attitudes in advertising and sold the business to a specialty pharmaceutical company in 2013. Today, the 51-year-old South Orange, N.J.-based VAGIPRENEUR™ shares her hard-earned wisdom with other female sexual health entrepreneurs through Amplify Growth, LLC, the consulting firm she founded to focus on female health and wellness. “I am driven to working with people finding products and solutions to make women’s lives better,”she observes. In addition to working with her clients on long-term strategies to grow their businesses, Scherl frequently speaks about entrepreneurship, blogs for The Huffington Post and will publish a book called Orgasmic Leadership™, based on interviews she’s conducted with other female sexual health entrepreneurs. Crediting her success to a rigorous work ethic and a gift for cultivating long-term relationships, “I’m also relentless,” she says. “I don’t stop until I find a solution to a problem.” Raised in Livingston, N.J., Scherl grew up in a culturally Jewish household, where “there were always interesting discussions.” From her father, an engineer and businessman, and her mother, a therapist, she learned about “creative problem-solving and the importance of giving back. Humor and movies were also very important in our family,” she says, recalling how her father loved quoting from the film, Rollerball, whenever she faced a challenge. “He would say, ‘No Time Outs, No Substitutions!’ – a line repeated in the 1976 film, meaning, you play to the bitter end.”

Scherl initially studied psychology at Duke University but ultimately decided to pursue a business career. After receiving her MBA from Stanford, she landed a product management job at McNeil Consumer Healthcare, a division of Johnson & Johnson, where she gained experience working on the TYLENOL® brand. She then spent two years as a principal at the Marketing Corporation of America, where she honed her strategic-thinking skills. In 1998, she cofounded SPARK Solutions for Growth with Jaensch, determined to create a better work-life balance while meeting the needs of her corporate clients. “That’s when I became an entrepreneur,” she says of building a consulting business that served both startups and Fortune 500 Companies including American Express and multiple divisions of Johnson & Johnson. “Mary and I worked extremely hard, but always had respect for each other’s family life and personal commitments.” Married to Zev Scherl and the mother of a daughter, 21, and a son, 17, Scherl sits on the leadership committee of the Partnership for Jewish Learning and Life, a program of her local Jewish Federation focusing on youth and family education. A graduate of the Wexner Foundation’s Heritage Program, she also serves on the board of Duke’s New York Women’s Forum and contributed to the development of an undergraduate curriculum on entrepreneurship at Duke. “I feel a drive to give back to the communities which I have been lucky enough to be part of,” she says. “I love being a resource for others, with the goal of hoping they can learn from my mistakes and successes and achieve their individual goals.” 

"I love the idea that I can help people accelerate their own learning and prevent them from making the same mistakes I did." JW Magazine | jwi.org/magazine

erin schrode

Schrode wound up launching a congressional campaign this past spring in her Northern California district that championed environmental health, student debt reform and human rights. Though she lost the election and experienced vicious anti-Semitic attacks from online trolls, “We laid out a message for success that went above and beyond coming in first,” she says of attracting national media coverage that helped “expand the definition of who can be a politician.” The now 25-year-old activist, social entrepreneur and gifted speaker is currently involved in the current campaign and spoke at the Democratic National Convention. Maintaining a whirlwind schedule, she continues to serve as a spokesperson for Turning Green, the nonprofit she co-founded at age 13 with her mother Judi Shils, writes eco-themed articles for Fusion, a media platform geared towards millennials, and speaks all over the world

"my campaign was the most grueling work I could imagine but I’d do it again, if that’s how I can best serve my community." 18

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“to inspire political involvement.” Often the youngest person “in any given room,” she credits her success to numerous mentors, being a perennial optimist and living by the motto, Dream and Do. “My mom and I share this,” she says. “When we see injustice, we take action.” Raised in Marin County, California, Schrode grew up in an environmentally conscious home “where lemons and vinegar were in and chemicals were out.” Instilled with a strong Jewish identity from visiting her grandparents and signing herself up for Hebrew school in the fifth grade, Schrode fell in love with Israel after taking a Birthright trip at age 19. “When I landed in Tel Aviv, I felt the most visceral sense of belonging,” she recalls. Schrode found her calling as an activist at age eleven when she watched her mother, a television producer turned community organizer, plan a door-to-door campaign to learn why her neighborhood had one of the highest cancer rates in the country. “This unfolded at my house with incredibly powerful activists. We then began to explore the links between lifestyle choices and cancer and other health risks,” she says of co-founding Turning Green two years later and empowering teens across the country to live environmentally conscious lives. A Dean’s Scholar at NYU, Schrode majored in social and cultural analysis and studied in Israel, Spain, Ghana and Argentina. In each country, she honed her skills as an activist, including writing an environmental education curriculum for Israeli, Palestinian and Jordanian youth. As she traveled through multiple countries, “I started to see that environmentalism knows no bounds and when I graduated from college, I wanted to keep doing what I was doing, realizing there was a niche for millennials like me to fill,” she says. Determined to stay “true to my values,” Schrode doesn’t rule out running for political office in the future. “My campaign was the most grueling work I could imagine but I’d do it again, if that’s how I can best serve my community,” she says. “My through line has always been to make the world a better place.” 

photo by Joshua LaCunha

By the time Erin Schrode decided to run for Congress at age 24, she had co-founded an environmental nonprofit, launched a project that provided school supplies to Haitian youth, assisted Syrian and Afghan refugees in Greece and Macedonia, traveled to 70 countries and harbored the fierce conviction that “the decisions of today will disproportionately affect young people. I never thought of running for office but we deserve a place at the decisionmaking table,” she says of aspiring to become the first under-30 congresswoman.

dr. jennifer verbesey Dr. Jennifer Verbesey caught “the surgery bug” during medical school, when she did a rotation involving wound care at Boston’s Hebrew Rehabilitation Center. “I’d go from room to room getting to know the residents and I loved that I could solve these small, surgical problems,” she recalls. Determined to become a surgeon, Verbesey eventually gained expertise in complex abdominal surgeries and discovered a passion for saving lives through organ transplants. Today, she stands out as the lone female surgeon in her department at MedStar Georgetown University Hospital in Washington D.C. As the director of the hospital’s Living Donor Kidney Transplant Program and the surgical director of the Pediatric Kidney Transplant Program, she specializes in facilitating compatible and incompatible matches between donors and recipients, ensuring the pre- and post-operative health of her patients. She also serves as an Assistant Professor of Surgery at Georgetown University Medical School, where she loves to bring her patients into the classroom and share “their amazing stories.” “Transplants are a gift of life,” she says. “And there’s nothing more rewarding than seeing recipients who feel better than they’ve felt in years and to work with donors, whom I find to be an incredibly altruistic group of people.”

and performing surgeries, often multiple times a day. Married to Paul Verbesey and the mother of Alex, 12, and Zoey, 10, she feels grateful that kidney transplants “offer some flexibility, where I’m in surgery at four o'clock in the morning so I can make my daughter’s lacrosse game at 11. I may not sleep much but I try not to miss anything when it comes to my kids,” she says. Raised in Centereach, N.Y., Verbesey grew up with a strong Jewish cultural identity and was “involved with everything,” including student government and her high school band. “My parents supported anything I was interested in,” she says of her mother, a math teacher, and her father, who taught social studies and coached high school basketball. At Duke University, Verbesey studied political science and spent her junior year at Hebrew University in Jerusalem, which was cut short due to the Persian Gulf War. Interested in multiple career paths including law and Middle East politics, she spent an additional year in Israel on a fellowship for college graduates from the Anna Sobol Levy Foundation before deciding to pursue medicine. “I always had very diverse interests, which is something I now encourage in my students,” she observes.

Crediting her success to several mentors, strong communication skills and an unflagging interest in her work, “where there’s always some new ethical issue to evaluate,” the 45-year-old surgeon spends her days coordinating kidney exchanges with other medical centers, seeing patients

After completing Harvard Medical School, Verbesey spent 11 years as a resident at Lahey Hospital & Medical Center, where she found her most important mentor in Dr. Elizabeth Pomfret, a liver and kidney surgeon. “She encouraged me every step of the way and I’ll never forget when she said, ‘I want to do for you what I wished someone had done for me,’’’ she recalls.

"there’s nothing more rewarding than seeing [transplant] recipients who feel better than they’ve felt in years."

Fiercely committed to improving the transplant process both locally and nationally, Verbesey belongs to the American Society of Transplant Surgeons and is currently working on increasing transplant access and education within the African-American community in Washington D.C. “I only hope to become more proficient at what I do,” she says. “And I hope to mentor other female surgical residents in the way that I was mentored.”  JW Magazine | jwi.org/magazine

andrea wolf Devoted to spreading the message that “virtually no one should die from breast cancer,” Wolf has found her calling at the Brem Foundation, a nonprofit committed to breast cancer prevention through early detection. The Foundation is named after her mother, Dr. Rachel Brem, a breast cancer survivor and a pioneer in the field of breast imaging. Since becoming president and CEO of the Foundation last year, Wolf has worked tirelessly to improve the foundation’s digital presence and to ensure the success of its programs, which include breast health education initiatives, a fund that assists women who cannot afford diagnostic tests, and a physician-training fellowship that incorporates community service. “I took this job because it matches the way I view the world,” observes the 33-year-old Washington D.C.-based advocate. “We help women become their own best advocates so they can take control of this disease.” With a talent for multi-tasking and a love of “planning and strategizing,” Wolf spends her days forging partnerships with corporations and nonprofits, fundraising, and speaking at events, often with her mother, a 2002 Woman to Watch. Starting her day at five in the morning to go running, she credits her success “to being very high energy, having a passion for being alive and working very hard when I believe in what I’m doing. And the rewards of this work are huge, to hear the stories of women whose lives are changed,” she says. Wolf grew up sitting with her mother “in the X-ray room” and accompanying her father, a neurosurgeon, on his rounds. “I saw how much my parents loved what they did and how deeply they impacted others’ lives. They made me believe I could do anything,” she recalls. 20

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Raised in Baltimore and the grandchild of Holocaust survivors, Wolf embraced observant Judaism in elementary school and, by eighth grade, would walk seven miles with her father to attend Shabbat services. “Judaism guides everything that I do,” she says of maintaining an observant home with her supportive husband Ariel Wolf and being an active member of Ohev Sholom, the National Synagogue. Wolf majored in political science at the University of Pennsylvania, where she was inspired to go into public service by Professor John DiIulio. After graduating from Penn she received her law degree from George Washington University. She then spent three years at the law firm Patton Boggs LLP, focusing on litigation and public policy, before joining the nonprofit Girls Inc. There she served as director of public policy and discovered her love for advocacy. “I learned how to connect with other advocates at the White House and on Capitol Hill about issues that matter for girls,” she says, crediting Girls Inc. CEO and President Judy Vredenburgh for mentoring her and showing her “how to run a successful nonprofit.” But her proudest role is being the mother of Eliana, 8, Lirone, 5, and Neshama Leah, 2, “They inspire me every day to see the beauty and potential in the world. They know how much I love what I do,” she says. “And I like that they see that I’m not only committed to them but to something much bigger than all of us.” 

"I took this job because it matches the way I view the world. we help women become their own best advocates so they can take control of this disease."

photo © Carl Cox 2016

When Andrea Wolf speaks to women about breast cancer, she shares her own story about testing positive for the BRCA1 mutation at age 22 and having prophylactic mastectomies at age 30. “A lot of good can come from being public about one’s story,” she observes. “If I can help change one person’s life by sharing my story, then speaking openly is well worth it.”

catherine zacks gildenhorn Sondra D. Bender community leadership honoree Catherine Zacks Gildenhorn felt compelled to be a Jewish activist at age 11 when she witnessed her father lead a fundraising campaign to support Israel during the Six-Day War. Six years later, during the Yom Kippur War, she “listened to the radio in the Rabbi’s study and brought reports on the war to my father, who reported to the Rabbi and the congregation,” she recalls. “These experiences left an indelible impression on me.” A lifelong supporter of Israel and Jewish continuity, Gildenhorn has now spent countless hours serving in community leadership roles for Jewish institutions, including The Jewish Federation of Greater Washington, where she recently stepped down from the Executive Committee and as vice president, Women’s Philanthropy; the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC); Adas Israel Congregation; and the Jewish Social Service Agency. She is also an alumna of The Wexner Heritage Foundation Program. Gildenhorn is passionate about building community through “philanthropy, social action and education,”and tries to “help others find the beauty and relevancy of Judaism in their own lives.” With a talent for big picture thinking and a collaborative leadership style, the 60-year-old Bethesda, Md,-based activist and philanthropist currently sits on the board of her local Federation, AIPAC’s Washington Steering Committee, and the National Women’s Philanthropy Board of the Jewish Federations of North America. Driven by her family’s philanthropic and activist legacy, in 2017 she will join the International Board of the Florence Melton School of Adult Jewish Learning, established by her late grandmother.The school is the largest pluralistic adult Jewish education network in the world.

"all of my jobs taught me about the power of storytelling to motivate people by reaching their hearts and minds."

Gildenhorn remains devoted to her role as editor-in-chief and spokesperson for Redefining Moments: End of Life Stories for Better Living, the book written by her late father after learning he had only weeks to live. “My dad wanted to start a conversation at the end of life about living purposely and lovingly every moment.” She started the Gordon and Carol Sue Zacks Better Living Initiative to encourage conversations and through which she donates copies of the book to cancer centers, hospitals, hospices and senior centers. Raised in Columbus, Ohio, Gildenhorn grew up in a Conservative Jewish home and credits her father, one of Young Leadership Cabinet and AIPAC’s founders, and grandmother, who invented the Dearfoams bedroom slipper, with “teaching me how to be a Jewish activist.” Determined to succeed, she majored in political science at the University of Michigan and earned a law degree from Emory. She led successful careers as a television news reporter, an attorney for a securities law firm and a political operative in charge of mobilizing the Jewish vote for the Reagan/Bush and the Bush/Quayle campaigns. Of all her achievements, Gildenhorn is “most gratified” by having served as a Presidential Appointee to the United States Holocaust Memorial Council during the opening of the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum. She trained as a docent for the museum and assisted its fundraising and development team. “All of my jobs taught me about the power of storytelling to motivate people by reaching their hearts and minds,” Gildenhorn says. This is a lesson she now applies to her community work. Married to fellow philanthropist Michael Gildenhorn, she is the mother of Edward, 23, Elissa, 20, and her golden retriever, Tyler. Gildenhorn will always support organizations and projects that “build common ground in the Jewish community. I always strive to work passionately, think outside the box and make the most of every moment. Just like my father taught me.”  JW Magazine | jwi.org/magazine

$AVING YO U R L I F E College students aren’t planning for their financial futures… but they should be. BY LAUREN LANDAU

ll college students – young women especially and even those fortunate enough to have all expenses (including spending money) covered by Mom and Dad – should be attentive to their financial future, and not just because of mounting student loan debt. That’s why sorority Sigma Delta Tau partners with JWI to bring the nonprofit’s Life$avings financial literacy workshops to SDT chapters across the country. “Our women are learning that with money of their own they will enjoy freedom and personal safety throughout their lives,” says Tami Ackerman, SDT’s national vice president of philanthropy and programming. “On the campuses where we have taken the program, our women have stated that they never knew how to take control of their finances and now feel like they’re in a better place to start managing their money early on, to be able to save for their future.” Life$avings® is one of those programs, and Deborah Rosenbloom – JWI’s vice president of programs and new initiatives – travels around the country to bring the series to women of all ages. When she teaches the workshop to college students, many are surprised that she emphasizes saving and investing for retirement even though to a 19- or 20-year-old that can seem eons away. Juniors and seniors in college worry about the immediate future, especially about landing a job after graduation, as well they should. But Rosenbloom urges them to also imagine themselves 45 years into the future, when their working days are winding down and opportunities to earn a paycheck are diminishing. That, she says, is what they should worry about. Some young people she talks to argue

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that they can’t yet afford to save for their retirement. Her response is that they can’t afford not to. “We’re living 10 or 15 years longer than men, so if a woman is married to a guy, she’s most likely going to outlive him or get a divorce. That’s the trajectory,” Rosenbloom says, noting that whatever their marital status, women workers also face the gender wage gap. “Be good to your future self,” Rosenbloom tells them. “Start planning now.” As “America’s Millennial Money Expert,” The College Investor founder Robert Farrington has made it his mission to help young adults escape student loan debt and start building wealth for the future. In an email, he tells JW magazine that it’s incredibly important for college students to be financially literate. The number one reason, he says, is mathematical. “The earlier you start saving and investing, the more time you allow your money to grow, and as such, the more money and wealth you’ll have in the future,” he says. “If you start investing at 22 versus 30, and invest the same amount of money, you could have hundreds of thousands more at 65. It’s powerful.” Emily Jacobs is a sophomore at the University of Maryland. She works most summers and saves about half of what she earns, but retirement is a distant thought. “It’s hard to plan so far in advance, because all I’m really thinking about is the next two years of college and how much I have to spend this summer and during the semester and when I go abroad,” she says. That’s pretty typical for college students, most of whom aren’t making a regular income yet. “A lot of the work with college students is really

planting the seeds,” Rosenbloom says. Life$avings® gets them to understand why knowing their credit score, talking about money with their partner, budgeting, investing for retirement, and saving for life’s inevitable bumps are all important, especially for women. Like many of the college students Rosenbloom speaks with, Jacobs doesn’t know her credit score. “All I know about my credit, since I don’t have a credit card, is that my parents just bought me a car and they put my name on it, which is going to establish my credit for the future,” she says.

during one workshop, a young woman texted her live-in boyfriend to ask about his credit score, only to get the unnerving response, “we have to talk.” In addition to knowing their own credit score, women should also know their partner’s. Rosenbloom says broaching that topic can be intimidating for young women, but is a necessary conversation to have. She recalls how during one workshop, a young woman texted her live-in boyfriend to ask him about his credit score, only to get the unnerving response, “We have to talk.” While credit scores can change, people generally don’t. “People have ‘money styles,’ so if a person is a compulsive spender, or gambler, that’s probably not going to change,” Rosenbloom says. “Women need to be aware of their partner’s money style. You need to know what you’re getting yourself into, because that’s going to have an impact on your own well-being.”

DailyWorth is the leading financial media company for professional women over the age of 30. Founder and CEO (and former JWI Woman to Watch) Amanda Steinberg says college-age women aren’t the company’s market, but she has seen what can happen down the line if they fall into certain financial traps. At 22, it’s easy to imagine a vast, open future. But like money, time is not limitless. Steinberg says many young women want to see the world, dress the part for that first job, and impress future boyfriends. These luxuries are exciting, look great on Instagram, and may feel more important to young women than their long-term finances. That is no coincidence. Steinberg says young women often hear messages in the media and from their own families that emphasize getting a good job or finding a husband. “These things are often positioned as more important than finance. Many women are told that money isn’t necessarily their responsibility,” Steinberg says. “So young women may think that they should prioritize things regardless of expense because someone else is going to take care of them, that their parents will bail them out or one day they’ll get married.” She says that lack of accountability is something that our society teaches women. That’s a problem, as is splurging now and leaving one’s future self with the bill. “I would say make sure that you don’t get so far into debt that you don’t understand what it really means to get out of it,” Steinberg says. “Things can really snowball on you.” Steinberg also recommends starting a savings habit. “While a lot of us are taught to live below our means and not to spend money that we don’t JW Magazine | jwi.org/magazine

have, that’s very different from actually building savings,” she says. “It’s one thing not to go into debt; it’s another thing to actually learn how to build savings, which is a muscle and a habit and one that will serve you so well for the rest of your life.” Not all young people are clueless about finance. University of Virginia junior Alyssa Imam has two part-time jobs and saves her money. She says she thinks about her career and financial future often, a habit she attributes to her family. Her dad, a former certified public accountant, taught his daughters to be mindful of their finances. Imam remembers shopping with her mother and being asked to check the price tag and weigh how often she’d wear an item. “I also thought a lot about money because I grew up in developing countries and there’s a really stark contrast between where we were financially and the vast majority of the people,” she says. Imam says her cousins in Bangladesh are more money conscious, especially those who will have arranged marriages. The thought of relying on a man for money doesn’t appeal to Imam, who values her independence. “My friends seem to think it will all work itself out, but I’m focused on saving now and getting a high-paying job so I won’t ever feel like I need someone else to supplement my income,” she says. “I want to feel like I could get di-

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vorced or walk away from something and still have the same lifestyle.” She’s not an anomaly. “There are a lot of college students who are very savvy with their money, can budget, and know how to save,” Farrington says. “There's another group that are interested in investing. But there is a larger group that have gone along with what everyone has told them and haven’t really looked at their own situation.”

to Commerce class and learned about different ways to save and invest, but I didn’t even know that financial literacy was an option.” Many campuses across the country have embraced this option. This fall, JWI will bring Life$avings® to the University of Kansas, Kent State, and the University of Michigan. 

want to bring

What he means is that a number of college students take out loans, get a credit card, and enroll in a checking account, all because someone tells them to. “They make it all work, but they’re effectively treading financial water,” he says.

Life$avings®

University of Virginia junior Amy Singer falls into that category. The 20-year-old saved the money she made as a camp counselor, but she’s fuzzy on the details of where it went. “Honestly, my dad helps me figure out what to do with it and pretty much does it for me,” she says. “If something were to happen tomorrow, I would not know how to deal with it all myself, and I really should.”

drosenbloom@jwi.org

For those who would like to learn how to plan for and navigate their financial futures, Life$avings® fills a serious void. “I didn’t even know that anyone taught financial literacy to people our age,” Singer says, but adds that she’d welcome the training on her own campus. “I took an Intro

to your community?

contact deborah rosenbloom:

Above: A Life$avings® participant at Stevens College in Hoboken, N.J.; below: a Life$avings® workshop at Bradley University in Peoria, Ill.

#VoteLikeAGirl Single women comprise America's most influential voting bloc. Learn what JWI is doing to encourage every woman to use her voice in the voting booth this November.

he fear of being told she â&#x20AC;&#x153;runs like a girlâ&#x20AC;? might make young women sit out a race in gym class, but JWI is using it as a rallying cry for an initiative to get out the vote and educate young women on critical issues during the upcoming election. Vote Like A Girl (Your Rights Depend On It!) combines several efforts to encourage women to participate in the electoral process.

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Launched on the heels of the White House United State of Women Summit, #VoteLikeAGirl is a non-partisan project that offers online tools to help engage young voters. Visitors to JWI’s website can access an interactive map that allows them to click on their state to access information about voter and absentee ballot registration. They’ll also be directed to the proper website where they can get it done. In addition to making sure everyone registers to vote, JWI is committed to providing a variety of reasons why women should care. The JW magazine website features interviews with dynamic women involved in all aspects of politics – politicians, campaign staffers and volunteers, professors, and journalists – who profess a range of political views. (These interviews, along with the rest of JWI's #VoteLikeAGirl materials, are also accessible through jwi.org/vote.) Any woman who has spoken out, written about the political process, accepted the mantle of leadership, spread the word, rallied, knocked on door after door or stuffed envelopes has something to say, and JWI wants the public to learn about her and why she votes, whatever her political views may be. As a nonprofit organization, JWI doesn’t push voters in one direction or another. However, with the understanding that Americans hold a number of diverse views on political topics, there are a few issues that JWI suggests voters consider. The local, state, and federal elections of November 2016 will impact critical rights for women, issues such as gun violence, equal pay, reproductive health, domestic abuse, sexual violence and paid family leave. In the spirit of inclusivity, JWI is also inviting women of all ages to share 26

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their most memorable moments as a voter. Whether it was her first time voting, an election she found herself deeply invested in, or a time she felt she truly made a difference, these women’s stories are valuable and inspiring. By pledging to #VoteLikeAGirl this November, voters promise to fight for whatever vision of the future they believe in. Through conversations, social media, word of mouth and visual messaging, such as the brightly colored #VoteLikeAGirl laptop stickers (see p.25) that JWI is offering in exchange for a $5 donation, women can proclaim that they’re informed, engaged, and ready for action. 

Above: Attendees at the White House United State of Women Summit show their support for JWI.; below: a member of JWI's Young Women's Leadership Network in New York.

#VoteLikeAGirl: Rebecca Traister The author of All the Single Ladies: Unmarried Women and the Rise of an Independent Nation talks about the election, the power of single women, and the importance of voting. BY LAUREN LANDAU

Q: Why should young single women who have even minimal interest in politics vote? Why should they care? A: For a million reasons! Certainly I think some people do care, for example, about the environment and about issues like global warming. They certainly care about the job market and employment possibilities. Many of them have good reason to care about reproductive rights and access to birth control, which are very much at stake in this election. I think that there are other issues such as voting rights, which are very much in peril, and should be of concern. A set of issues that doesn’t yet resonate for them is paid family leave and paid sick days. When you are young, especially now that women are having children later in life than ever before, this seems very distant. But I wish that there were a way to communicate that those things are going to be big issues for them, maybe five, ten or twenty years down the line. Q: How powerful is the American single woman voter? A: The election of Barack Obama in 2008 proved generations of people wrong about young people’s willingness to come out and vote. The same is true for single women. Single women not only contributed to Barack Obama’s election in 2008; by many metrics, the demographic of unmarried women, which overlaps very much with young women, was responsible for his re-election in 2012.

This is the first election cycle where it is predicted that there will be more unmarried women in the electorate than married women.

cans are actually living [today]. Our policies have not caught up. That’s why issues such as pay equity and higher minimum wage are crucial to unmarried women. Because men were presumed to be the earners and women were presumed to handle domestic work, with their public and professional work valued less, we have enormous pay gaps – a disadvantage since more women now live independently of men. Q: Is there anything you’d like to add that you feel is especially important for young women?

Q: So are single women voters even more critical in this election than in the last? A: Yes. The number of unmarried women in this country is growing and has been for the past few decades, and they vote very differently from married women. Married women tend to vote Republican and unmarried women vote Democratic by a massive margin. There are all kinds of laws that assume that most Americans are married. That’s simply not the way most Americans live anymore. What we need is a whole new set of economic and social policies that account for how Ameri-

A: The remarkable thing about young women today is they have a future that is so different from that of their mothers. For so many generations, women were taught: This is what adulthood looks like; this is what you can expect from it. Now when I look at young women, I’m saying, “I don’t know what your futures are going to entail.” The openness of possibility for their futures, but also the real pitfalls of living in a country that was designed with a very different path in mind for them, should lead them to think about what they will need going forward. Better government support, protected reproductive rights, higher minimum wages, lower college costs, subsidized child care, paid leave, better and more reliable health care, pay equity – these things are going to make it possible for them to live with the same opportunities that have historically been available to their male peers. 

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There's so much more magazine online!

Visit jwi.org/magazine for always-new content on careers, money, spirituality, food, books and more.

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It fails to compute why the number of women pursuing tech careers hasnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t been growing. Thatâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s why activists are working to transform the tech field into a friendlier space. BY ELICIA BROWN

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illary Mickell’s resume reads like a list of who’s who in the last 30 years of the tech explosion: Microsoft. Netscape. Shutterfly. Yahoo. Paypal. At these Internet giants, and later as the co-founder of a successful startup, Mickell mostly encountered a “dynamic, forward thinking, highly educated group of people intent on changing the way we do everything.” And yet, women employees of tech firms report big and small grievances that can make office-life uncomfortable. The corporate humor can sound like it was lifted from a Mad Men episode. As Mickell recounts, it’s not unheard of for executives to mock a female colleague as suffering from “pregnancy brain,” or “new mommy brain.” Likewise, Mickell and Foodily co-founder Andrea Cutright were taken aback a few years ago while pitching their recipe-sharing network to a gathering of potential investors. “It’s a good thing you women aren’t fat,” one of the men teased. Mickell didn’t appreciate the joke. “Many things are accepted as traditional behavior,” she says. A tiny woman with a slender build, Mickell has a strong and direct style of speaking, whether it’s about the nutrition of kale or best business practices. She says: “Executives need to take a step back and change; they need to be more sensitive.” Mickell, who sold Foodily, billed as “the world’s largest recipe search engine,” last year to IAC for an undisclosed amount, has been at the forefront of a small but growing movement that is transforming the tech industry. Much maligned in the media for its “brogrammer” fraternity culture, and criticized for a practice of inequitable pay and promotions, the industry has been undergoing a shift in the last five years as it aims to retain and attract women. Many of the initiatives for change are being spearheaded by women. Earlier this year, Mickell, together with a group of highpowered tech friends from the San Francisco Bay area, released results of a survey they designed, “Elephant in the Valley.” The survey, which focused on mid-to-upper level women in the tech industry, asked questions about promotion, harassment and unconscious biases, among other topics. The results were astounding. “I was pretty surprised,” says Mickell. “Eighty-four percent of respondents were told they were too aggressive; 72 percent were asked about children and mental status,” 30

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she says. “It’s not just about sensational stories that came out of the [Ellen Pao] trial. It’s important for people to understand the quieter biases.” That’s not to downplay the role of overt discrimination. In 2012, Ellen Pao, a graduate of Princeton with a degree in electrical engineering sued her employer, a Silicon Valley venture capital firm, for gender discrimination. While she lost the case, she raised the volume of conversation around the issue, and has recently helped launch a non-profit venture called Project Include, which will collect and share data about how tech companies are diversifying their staff. The yearning for systemic change arises amid much disconcerting data. The number of women leaving college with degrees in computer science peaked in 1984 (at 37 percent), and fell to an all-time low in 2011 (at 11 percent). “Half of women in tech drop out of their career,” says Heather Cabot, a former web-life editor for Yahoo. Moreover, only 7 percent of investor money goes to women-led start-ups, according Allyson Kapin, a 2015 JWI Woman to Watch and co-founder of the Rad Campaign, a web agency devoted to advocating for socially-conscious non-profits. Kapin believes the relative lack of funding for products designed by women is “hugely problematic. If the goal is to create the most innovative products, you need to do it through a diverse lens, not just through a white male lens.” But Kapin isn’t waiting around for investors to wake up. In 2015, in partnership with Craig Newmark of craigslist, she launched “Women Startup Challenge.” The challenge hosts events for women-led startups to showcase their ideas, and has already raised more than $1 million for female entrepreneurs. “There’s lots of grassroots activity of women helping each other, of women driving this conversation, of women creating a movement,” said Cabot, who is the co-author, along with Samantha Parent, of the book Geek Girl Rising: Inside the Sisterhood Shaking Up Tech, expected to be published by St. Martin’s Press in the spring of 2017. Geek Girl will explore how these pioneers are changing the face of technology, transforming it into a hospitable environment for women.

It’s A Girl Thing

The shift is taking place at every level and stage of career: Projects like Kapin’s aim to make funds more available to women entrepreneurs; others work to eliminate

inequitable practices in compensation or to teach female executives how to deliver a Ted Talk; still others are introducing change into computer science departments at colleges, providing mentors and networking opportunities for young women. Hundreds of programs aim to boost the confidence and interest of middle-school girls. Leigh Wolberger, a seventh-grade student at the Rooftop School in San Francisco, is among the hundreds of thousands of adolescent girls to benefit from Expanding Your Horizons Network (EYH), one of the oldest initiatives focused on encouraging girls to pursue STEM-related careers. Leigh, who has wanted to be a paleontologist since first grade, enjoyed the hands-on workshop run by EYH at San Francisco State University, including a program on the changing chemistry of oceans and another on how diseases spread, all led by women professionals. She said that a lot of participants had imagined scientists to be men. “It made me a lot more excited about growing up and learning more about the sciences,” she said. Some ventures concentrate on an even younger set. Goldieblox, a toy company that launched in 2012, targets

girls aged 4 to 8. The colorful construction kits include stories of Goldie, a girl inventor. Founder Debbie Sterling, featured in Geek Girl Rising, hopes to appeal to girls before they start adsorbing society’s stereotypical ideas about gender. Sterling says she studied engineering at Stanford after a high school math teacher planted the idea in her head, but as a little girl she was always disappointed when older relatives complimented her intelligence. “They would grab me by the punim [face] and say, ‘Debbie you are so smart.’ I wanted to be pretty. I didn’t want to be smart,” Sterling says in a Ted Talk. She says she still doesn’t completely fit into the world of engineering. But, she adds, “I believe your daughters will.”

Repairing the World

Among the pioneers hoping to reshape the industry are many Jewish women, including those quoted here. Some find their interest in the field growing because of roots in Israel – the land of milk, honey, and tech startups. Jewish women also connect the “call of coding” to tikkun olam, repairing the world. JW Magazine | jwi.org/magazine

Rachel Sheinbein, who is profiled in Geek Girl Rising and is the president of the board of Expanding Your Horizons, puts it simply: “An engineering career can help you to give back.” Because of the endless possible products an engineer can introduce to the world, she says, “I believe that engineering can contribute to the healing of the world.” Inspired in part by a summer program during high school in which she engaged in hands-on projects like building a pseudo-dialysis machine, Sheinbein studied engineering at the University of Pennsylvania and later at Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Now, as the managing director of Makeda Capital, she engages in another form of healing the world: She angel invests in many ventures started by women entrepreneurs. Others say that a sense of social justice or tzedek, relates to their interest in helping transform the tech industry. In addition to writing a book, Heather Cabot is the man-

aging director of Golden Seeds, which invests in nascent women-led ventures, including some tech firms. The child of former Jewish Federation presidents, Cabot says that her upbringing instilled in her the importance of working to make the world a better place. She hopes that Geek Girl Rising will help a lot of women.

Brave New World

Lenore Blum is among the earliest pioneers to turn her attention to women’s roles in technology. A computer science professor at Carnegie Mellon University who has helped drive a revolution of sorts in her department, Blum began her career at a time when most top math departments closed their doors to women at the doctoral level. Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), however, took a chance.

Six Tips from Women in Tech Succeed By Failing

Young women often tend toward perfectionism, never wanting to be wrong or get a bad grade. Justine Henning, co-founder of Math4Science, a non-profit devoted to improving math and science education, and Heather Cabot, co-author of Geek Girl Rising: Inside the Sisterhood Shaking Up Tech, stress that risk-taking, taking a chance on getting it wrong is the best way to succeed in the tech field. Says Cabot: “Tech is all about iterating, tweaking it, being open to pivoting. Sometimes you have to fail in order to figure out a solution to a problem.”

Fear Factor

It’s hard not to be intimidated by male peers who started coding before they even reached the age of bar mitzvah. Don’t be afraid, advises Barr Yaron, a data scientist for Facebook in Tel Aviv. “You can do it. Don’t shut out what you’re excited about because you’re intimidated,” says Yaron, who grew up in Philadelphia and studied math, computer science and economics at Harvard. Apply to every internship, she advises. Let the organization determine whether you have the qualifications.

Consider Boot Camp

Majoring in computer science isn’t necessary, says Tamar Weinberg. “You don’t need college to learn to code,” says Weinberg, a social media and marketing professional who works for a few companies from her Westchester, N.Y., home. “You need a boot camp. In three months you can get a solid footing in programming.” 32

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Just Say No

Early in her career Deborah Berebichez spent too much energy and time keeping everyone happy. “I wanted to be liked,” says Berebichez, a physicist, the host of Discovery Channel’s Outrageous Acts of Science TV show and a 2015 JWI Woman to Watch. “I said ‘yes’ to too many projects,” she says. “I was always overwhelmed. Men can be perceived as competent and likeable even if they are curt.”

Star Power

Only woman in the room? It could be an asset. While the negative issues associated with the lopsided ratio in the industry are well-known and raise genuine concerns, several women in tech noted that they enjoyed being in the spotlight. “At a lot of big tech events, most of the room is filled with men. Women complain about it. I like it,” says Esther Kuperman, who is involved in developing and designing apps. “You stand out more.”

Hopper is a Happening

Young women pursuing tech should mark their calendars for the annual Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing, taking place this year from October 19-21 in Houston. Since 1994, this conference has been the biggest gathering for women technologists to meet and to mentor, to exchange ideas and experiences. And it’s getting bigger, fast: Last year, the event drew 12,000 people from 63 countries, a 50 percent increase from the year before.

Clockwise from top left: Hillary Mickell, Leigh Wolberger, Debbie Sterling, Rachel Sheinbein, Lenore Blum, Heather Cabot, and Allyson Kapin

Blum graduated from MIT in 1968, and her political consciousness awakened almost immediately. With surprise, she observed the inequitable job market, and soon became active in a network of female mathematicians. For three years in the early 1970s, she served as president of the Association for Women in Mathematics. More recently, Blum has focused on expanding opportunities for women students at Carnegie Mellon, a top-ranking school for computer science, where she has worked since 1999. The results have been striking. While most schools have been bemoaning the diminishing numbers of women in computer science (about 18 percent nationwide), Carnegie Mellon has increased its percentage of women majoring in computer science. In a recent year, the figure stood at more than 40 percent. “It’s not rocket science,” says Blum, whose colleagues Carol Frieze and Jeria Quesenberry, published the book Kicking Butt in Computer Science: Women in Computing at Carnegie Mellon University. She says college programs need to “level the playing field by explicitly providing

professional experiences crucial for success (such as mentors, role models, networks, advisors, colleagues), experiences that have been implicitly available for those in the majority.” Carnegie Mellon has growing company among colleges seeking to welcome more women computer scientists. Harvey Mudd and the Anita Borg Institute have reportedly also boosted the number of female computer science students to around 40 percent after introducing systematic change. Some 15 other colleges are following their lead. Blum has been watching the shift with interest. Still, she says she’d like to see “a lot more women being the inventors. There’s a real push to encourage that.” She notes her recent research, which showed that men and women are equally equipped to code, and to learn the technical aspects of computing that you need to build components, to follow through with an idea and invent a new product. “I think things could change very quickly,” says Blum. “We are at a point of inflection.”  Elicia Brown is a freelance writer based in Manhattan.

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when the heart breaks While religion may fail to comfort a woman facing infertility and loss, Jewish spirit can still buttress a broken heart. BY DANIELLE CANTOR

wo months before my wedding, a time when most brides are scouring Pinterest and overthinking hors d’oeuvres, I was lobbying my very traditional fiancée to try to make a baby. “But our child could be conceived out of wedlock!” he protested. “Not gonna happen,” I reassured him. “I’m 37; this could take a while. Let’s get a jump on it, shall we?” He relented, and not long after what I’d promised would be a practice run, I stood under the chuppah, six weeks pregnant. We were shocked, ecstatic, and blinded by a first-timer’s foolish expectation that nothing could possibly go wrong. 34

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image created with elements from Freepik.com

At the end of the first trimester, I started to bleed. “I’m so sorry,” the nurse squeezed my foot in the stirrup. “There’s no heartbeat.” The next day I marched out of the hospital with an empty womb and a determined spirit. “Onward!” I told my husband. “We’ll get it right next time.” When I met my newborn niece the following weekend, I counted her tiny toes and felt only joy for my brother and his wife. I fully expected to be pregnant again in no time; a mommy within the year. My niece is now three years old – and a big sister – and I have since acquired a scar on my belly from an ectopic pregnancy; an abortion clinic's business card with two tiny footprints on the back, which is all I have left of the brain-damaged little girl I lost in the 25th week; and a storage locker full of baby gear that seems less and less likely to fulfill its destiny, at least not with any child of mine. My husband and I have delayed buying a larger home, repurposing our down payment savings into fertility treatment funds, only to learn that my eggs had probably expired before we even met. A relative agreed to donate eggs to us, then changed her mind. I am now 41 years old, empty-handed and broken-hearted. Oh – and 10 pounds overweight. I tell my husband I’ve grown fat from all those fertility drugs, but I’m pretty sure he knows I eat my feelings. At this point in another woman's story, we might discuss the comforting embrace of God. Crisis does tend to drive people toward religion – but it can also drag them away. While I was never much of a believer to begin with, this journey has turned me upside down and shaken out whatever faith I had like loose change. After the first couple of losses and setbacks I would think, “Surely it’s my turn now. I've suffered; I’ve bled; I’m

I wasn’t sure I believed in God, but from the bottom of my Jewish heart I thanked Him while I cursed Him, and it helped me find my balance again. due my happy ending.” Then my baby girl died, after I’d felt her kicks and chosen her name, and I wondered if I was being punished. Was it because I’d been a difficult child? Was I selfish or cruel? Maybe I shouldn’t have told my sister the name I’d picked. I knew it was bad luck – did I thumb my nose at fate? Eventually I settled on the belief that if there was a higher power, it had more pressing concerns, and God, or “the universe,” owed me nothing. We don’t all get what we deserve. But while Judaism may not have guided me through my crisis, being Jewish certainly did. The Yiddish folk tale I read as a child said it best: "Things could always be worse." That quintessentially Jewish sentiment tethered me to gratitude while I floated around in my grief, feeling forsaken. Jewish pragmatism insisted that I still “thank God”: for modern medicine; for the freedom to choose; for the resources to pay for my abortion; that, late as it was, we learned of the baby’s problems in time to terminate. I wasn’t sure I believed in God, but from the bottom of my Jewish heart I thanked Him while I cursed Him, and it helped me find my balance again. (I also had my grandmother – the only member of her family to leave Auschwitz alive – to periodically remind me, “This is terrible, but it is not a tragedy.”) My (uncertain) agnosticism afforded me the clarity to weigh quality of life against sanctity of life and make a choice – my own pain of loss over my child's prolonged suffering, if she was

to be born – without the crutch of religion. The decision was easy to make, if harder to live with, and I was – I am – grateful for the spiritual freedom. I will admit, though, that for a while I thought a lot about the soul: Did the baby have one? If she did, was I still her mother, or would she find another body – a healthy one – and become part of someone else's family? Might she return to me one day in another form? Not long after the abortion, I asked a Chabad rabbi at a Rosh Hashanah dinner if he believed that an unborn baby has a soul. I can’t remember his answer, just that he somehow acquired my phone number and called later that week to ask for my Hebrew name so he could “make a bracha” that my husband and I would be fruitful and multiply. The following week, I informed my husband that I would not be joining him at Yom Kippur services. Once a good sport about it, this time I could not stare into an open prayer book and gamely sit, stand, and hum along. Whatever sins were in my past, I had decided that God and I were square now, and I was done with the charade. My husband donned his suit and walked to shul alone. I burrowed into the sofa, clutched the tiny pink cap I had knitted for our daughter, and prayed into the silence: “Please forgive me, baby girl. You would have suffered so much. I did it because I love you.”  Danielle Cantor is creative director at JWI.

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See what's growing as JWI's Young Women's Leadership Network expands westward. s Paul Simon once crooned in “Paranoia Blues,” New York City is a place “where they roll you for a nickel and they stick you for the extra dime.” But in a city where they might otherwise be on their own, members of JWI’s Young Women’s Leadership Network have each other’s backs. That support system can be uncharacteristic of women, notes Talia Solomon, marketing manager for Bravo and a New York Network board member. “There’s sometimes a sense of competition.” In the Network, however, women work to empower, not undercut, each other. Members help one another develop meaningful friendships and look into different job opportunities. “It’s been really great to see women coming together in the organization, wanting to help each other out,” she says. When the Network launched in Washington, D.C. in 2013, the goal was to bring young professional Jewish women together, “It seemed like there was a hole in the D.C. Jewish community; a space for young professional Jewish women to come together and attend events, assume leadership roles, hone professional and leadership development skills, and build a community of like-minded women,” says Miri Cypers, a founding board member of the Network and director of Federal Affairs and Partnerships at Americans for Responsible Solutions. With funding from the Sondra D. Bender Community Leadership Institute, not only did the Network launch and successfully build that community in D.C., it also expanded to New York City in the fall of 2015 and is set to launch in Denver, Colorado this September. Adriane Greenberg is a member of the Mile High

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City’s inaugural Network board. “Colorado does a great job in trying to bring young people into the community,” the young mother and business manager for a small communications company says. But like D.C. before the Network's launch, Denver is missing something. “There’s a lot for young Jewish people, but nothing really specific for young Jewish women,” Greenberg says. “When you go through your schooling, you have different avenues to be a leader. You have BBYO and NFTY, and summer camp.” After college, she says, those leadership opportunities evaporate. “I think this program is going to be a great way to bridge the gap between Jewish youth programs and being a leader in the Jewish community a little bit later in life.” Her sister-in-law Rachael Greenberg agrees. Born and raised in Denver, the senior associate account manager at KPMG, an audit, tax and advisory services company, and Network board member, says she loves that the network is accessible to “all young professional women who happen to be Jewish.” “My hope is that it will attract a multitude of women that are working in different industries at different points in their career, and we can learn and mentor and network with each other,” she says. “I feel like that is really missing from the Denver community.” If the other cities are an example, the Network will soon fill that void in Denver. After just one year in the Big Apple, it has a committed New York board that organizes monthly events for the group’s growing membership.

Young Women's Leadership Network National Coordinator Sasha Altschuler (left) and New York network board member Jackie Soleimani at an event in New York City.

“In New York, we started with our small board, and it’s been growing based on our personal connections,” board member and real estate salesperson Amanda Paul says. “Now that we’ve been around for a few months, women are coming to events that don’t know anyone there, but have just heard that it’s a neat thing to check out.” The New York Network, like those in the other cities, provides something not seen in other Jewish organizations. “Within the Network there’s a big focus on professional development and empowering women to be independent when it comes to finances,” Talia Solomon says. While she appreciates those other groups, many of them focus solely on Jewish identity. Originally from a small town in Florida, Paul says the Network also provides a diverse network of peers and older women, mentors that she and other members can turn to. “Having them come and speak to us and hear how they got to where they are has been a huge perk of being in this network,” she says. “Having exposure to high-powered women and CEOs of different companies in that intimate environment opens up the floor for discussion a lot more than going to a lecture hall with 200 other women.” That makes it easier to ask questions, and to make friends. Alyssa Weiner, senior associate for the Department of International Jewish Affairs at the American Jewish Committee, recently joined the D.C. board after being involved with the Network for about a year. An alumna of George Washington University, Weiner says most of her friends moved after graduation. “I was really looking for a group of new girlfriends, a network I could feel comfortable with, girls I could feel inspired by, and who I could really count on and learn from,” she says. “I can now call some of my very best friends women I’ve met through this network.” In addition to those friendships, Weiner has benefitted from the Network's numerous events.

...IN THE NETWORK, WOMEN WORK TO EMPOWER, NOT UNDERCUT, EACH OTHER; MEMBERS HELP ONE ANOTHER DEVELOP MEANINGFUL FRIENDSHIPS AND LOOK INTO DIFFERENT JOB OPPORTUNITIES.

“You can really get great personal and professional skills out of these events,” she says, adding that each one presents unique opportunities for growth. There are Shabbat dinners that provide a spiritual connection, professional development workshops that teach marketable skills, and a philanthropy series for women who want to make a difference. In any given month, members might be learning how to make challah, how to finance their first home, or how to update their resumes. “I loved the ‘Pitch Perfect’ event,” Weiner says, referring to the March 2016 workshop with literary agent Gail Ross, who taught attendees how to pitch their ideas. “Learning how to be confident in your work and how to sell yourself, I probably use those skills every day.” But Weiner’s most memorable moment came this past May when she served on the committee of the Network's High Tea. Proceeds from the elegant fundraiser benefitted JWI’s Flower Project, which sends bouquets and financial literacy resources to 200 domestic violence shelters on Mother’s Day. “This was the event that brought me into a leadership position and really is the reason I wanted to join the board,” Weiner says. “Seeing the success of the event – over 40 women and girls came and we raised about $2,000 for the Flower Project – was amazing.”

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Young Women's Leadership Network members enjoy a happy hour networking event in July 2016. Attendees heard powerful stories from Naomi Taffet, assistant director at CHANA, a Baltimore-based program for people experiencing abuse and interpersonal trauma. She spoke about JWI’s impact on women’s lives. Kyle Lierman, head of the It's On Us sexual assault prevention campaign, spoke about White House efforts to improve conditions for women. “You could really see how influential JWI is in the lives of women everywhere,” Weiner says. “The tea was such a beautiful way of connecting the members of the Network with the work of JWI,” Meredith Jacobs, JWI’s vice president of marketing and communications, said after the event. “What I keep hearing from network members is that it’s wonderful that we provide these leadership and growth opportunities, but what they most appreciate is connecting with a Jewish women’s organization working on issues they care about.” In addition to its events, the Network hosts a conference held annually in conjunction with JWI’s Women to Watch luncheon in Washington. Luncheon honorees, notable women from a variety of fields, speak at the conference and interact with Network members. This year’s conference will take place on Sunday, December 11. Sasha Altschuler is national manager of the Network. As a millennial, she’s also solidly within its target demographic, which she says gives her a better perspective and ability to run the group, not to mention a stronger handle on adulthood. “The financial workshops have been extremely beneficial in my life and building my financial literacy,” she says.

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Like D.C. and New York, Denver is a hub for young professionals. “Millennials are flocking to the Mile High City,” The Wall Street Journal declared last year. For newcomers seeking friends, professional mentors, and a connection to their Jewish identity, the Network plays a key role. “Millennials are moving here all the time and they have so much to offer,” Adriane Greenberg says. “[The Network] is a great avenue for young Jewish women to be able to learn about leadership and make a difference in the community.” “Denver is a very different landscape from New York and Washington, D.C., so I hope we can put our own Colorado spin on things,” Rachael Greenberg says. “It’s definitely a different work-life balance here, a different work culture, but I think all the same education that the Network has been instilling in its members is so needed here.” Altschuler says she wants Network board members in Denver, New York and D.C. to feel a sense of independence and ownership. “I want this really to be theirs,” she says. “That’s why I encourage them to invite their friends and their own networks so that when they show up to an event, there are people they recognize, people they’re close with and people they have been connected with.” She hopes the Network will build enough of those connections to support future launches and ultimately, a national board with roots in cities across the U.S. Solomon would also like to see an expanded, collaborative network. She says whether a young woman is new to a city or just visiting, it would be a huge asset to have “a net of Jewish women there to help you in any way you need.” 

Amplifying the

Call for

Paid Safe Days Domestic Violence Awareness Month is the perfect time to promote workplace policies that give abused employees paid time off to secure protection. BY ILANA FLEMMING

WI has long worked to prevent domestic violence, provide tools for healthy relationships, and teach girls and women about financial literacy, economic independence, and how to build safe and thriving futures. This October, Domestic Violence Awareness Month(DVAM), JWI will launch a campaign in support of the Healthy Families Act, a bill that would establish a national standard for paid sick and safe days. Paid safe days are a crucial protection for victims and survivors of violence. A simple addition to paid sick days policy, paid safe days provide victims with job-protected time off from work to seek services related to domestic abuse, sexual violence or stalking. Survivors must be able to find safe housing, seek medical care, or attend a court date without putting their financial stability or job security at risk. Paid safe days would provide that protection. Working at the intersection of economic security and free-

dom from abuse, this year’s DVAM campaign builds on JWI’s history of advocacy for women and girls. The National Network to End Domestic Violence cites financial dependence as one of the top reasons why victims of domestic violence stay with abusers. This is not just about buying groceries. For a woman in an abusive relationship, a job can provide a path to freedom: employment is a bridge between a violent, dangerous present and a safe, stable future. A steady job provides crucial financial independence that is necessary to build a life free from violence—but not if the victim’s job is at risk due to abuse. Currently, no federal law protects victims with leave time to address needs related to abuse, and only 15 states have such laws. In 2013, a New York woman named Natasha Velez was fired from her job at a restaurant after her boyfriend attacked her, fracturing her finger. Velez

claimed that her manager said she had too many personal “issues” causing her to miss work, even after she showed him a domestic violence protection order and a doctor’s note. Unfortunately, this story is not unique. Leaving an abusive relationship is a process that requires careful timing and planning to ensure safety, but too many women are forced to choose between a job and safety. For many victims, losing days of income or jeopardizing employment is a chance they can’t take, forcing impossible compromises that leave women at risk. The Healthy Families Act is a simple, powerful proposal that would help victims and survivors as they build toward safe and healthy futures. Learn more and join JWI’s DVAM 2016 campaign for paid safe days at jwi.org/DVAM and call your Member of Congress to ask them to cosponsor the Healthy Families Act.  JW Magazine | jwi.org/magazine

Bringing a letter to a gun fight could help close legal loopholes that put firearms in abusers' hands.

hen abusers have guns, women die. That is a cold, hard, indisputable fact that’s supported by overwhelming evidence. The problem is clear and so is its solution: close the dangerous loopholes that give some abusers access to guns.

JWI’s Interfaith Coalition Against Domestic and Sexual Violence – a group of 36 faith-based organizations united in efforts to end violence against women and girls – is committed to closing these loopholes. Under federal law, if individuals are convicted of a domestic violence misdemeanor against a current or former spouse, the parent of their child, or an intimate partner with whom they’ve lived, they are prohibited from purchasing or possessing guns.

JWI staff and interns deliver the Interfaith Coalition's call to action to Rep. Bob Dold on June 9, 2016.

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But the law doesn’t protect those who never married, shared a home with, or had a child with their abuser. Stalking victims are also left unprotected, which poses a major risk as more than three-quarters of women killed by intimate partners were also stalked by their abuser. Lawmakers in both the House and Senate are working to close these life-threatening loopholes through two bipartisan bills: H.R. 3130, the Zero Tolerance for Domestic Abusers Act, and S. 1520, the Protecting Domestic Violence and Stalking Victims Act. The Interfaith Coalition issued a call to action, asking people from all spiritual backgrounds to call, email, and tweet congressional representatives and senators on May 18th to demand change and spread awareness about the intersection of guns, domestic violence, and stalking. Using the hashtags #ProtectAllWomen and #FaithsAgainstDV, people all over the country took to their phones and computers to urge elected officials to cosponsor the bills. In a letter signed by nearly 500 clergy and national faithbased organizations, including Christian, Jewish, Muslim, and Baha’i, the Interfaith Coalition urged members of Congress to act. “As clergy members and faith-based organizations representing a diverse range of religious traditions, we believe that every person has the right to live free from violence and we are committed to fostering safe homes and communities,” the letter begins. “Domestic violence, dating abuse, and stalking are extreme violations of the dignity and humanity of a person, and these crimes have no place in our faith traditions.” On June 9th, JWI staff and interns hand-delivered the letter to every member of Congress and met with Congresswoman Debbie Dingell (D-MI-12) and Congressman Bob Dold (R-IL-10), who together introduced H.R. 3130. These two representatives come from different sides of the aisle but are united in their commitment to making sure no convicted abuser has legal access to firearms. “No woman and no child should ever live in fear of their life or their safety because of domestic violence,” Dingell said in a press release. “We should do everything we can to prevent families from experiencing senseless tragedies. This bipartisan, commonsense bill will help ensure every woman and child is protected – and it will save lives.” In the same statement, Dold asserted that, “As a society, we should have zero tolerance for domestic abuse and need to do everything we can to stop domestic violence from turning into domestic murder.” Domestic violence is an epidemic in the United States, where one in four women experiences physical abuse at

JWI's 2016 summer interns delivering the Interfaith Coalition's letter on Capitol Hill. the hands of an intimate partner. To make a bad situation worse – deadly, in fact – the presence of a gun in an abusive home raises the risk of homicide for a woman by five hundred percent. (National Domestic Violence Hotline). According to the U.S. Department of Justice, more than half of women murdered with guns are killed by family members or intimate partners. “There is also a strong connection between stalking and future violence,” the Interfaith Coalition’s states, citing one study that found 76 percent of women murdered by a current or former intimate partner experienced stalking in the year leading up to the murder. The Coalition also noted that, in many cases, misdemeanor stalking convictions begin as domestic violence charges. As a result, the numbers are likely more alarming than national statistics imply. The connection, however, is clear: stalkers and abusers should not have access to guns. “Whether she’s gone on five dates, been married for five years, or had five children with him – a woman is not safe when her abuser has access to guns,” JWI CEO Lori Weinstein said in a statement. “Faith leaders, Republicans, Democrats, and gun owners support this legislation. It’s not controversial; it’s commonsense, and we need it now. Women’s lives are depending on it.” 

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Creating a wedding that sets the tone for a marriage. BY RAHEL MUSLEAH

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or the past year, it’s been wedding season in my family, as my two nieces, a nephew, and one of my sisters have all gotten married. Each wedding was different, bearing the imprint of personalities, partners, ages, families and traditions. They not only took place in June, but in various seasons, and featured color schemes ranging from mauve and taupe to navy and gold. Their ceremonies have been similarly diverse, merging rituals from India and Iraq (my family background) with American, Ashkenazic and Israeli customs. When my niece, Penina Case, 28, married, she and her fiancé, Eli Polofsky, modified Sephardic and Ashkenazic rites to fit their ideals. As is customary in the Baghdadi-Indian tradition, the couple faced the congregation under the chuppah, and my father (Penina’s grandfather) conducted the ceremony according to the Baghdadi liturgy. The very last word of the blessings, u-matzliach – a wish that the marriage will be successful – is our family name. The Ashkenazic tradition of the bride’s seven circuits around the groom – one explanation bases the custom on the seven days of creation, reflecting the creation of a new family – was important to Polofsky’s family, but it felt “man-centric” to Case. To mirror their equality in their marriage and to show that their worlds revolve around each other, she circled him three times and he circled her three times, reciting appropriate biblical verses. For the last circuit, they made a half circle each around the other, never unlocking their eyes. “We created rituals that spoke of family traditions and history, and were meaningful to us as individuals,” says Case. “It felt very rich.”

Despite the regularity and acceptance with which couples live together today – about 12 percent of couples living together are unmarried (Familyfacts.org) – getting married remains a goal for many. In fact, over half marry their partners within five years (unmarried.org). Case lived with Polofsky for three-and-a half years. Getting married, she says, infused their relationship with a deeper level of spirituality and commitment. “There’s a certain something in getting married, another step we could take. As the wedding got closer we began to appreciate and understand each other even more. I feel I’ve fallen more in love with Eli,” she says. Even the planning process, filled with compromise, financial, logistical and family issues, allowed an element of growth that they wouldn’t have experienced otherwise, she adds. The diversity in types of marriages – first, second, gay, interfaith, and more – has not stopped Jewish ritual from being an essential component at weddings. An interfaith ketubah signing party even made it to the television screen in one of the last episodes of CBS’s The Good Wife. “The wedding ceremony is a sacred drama that transforms status, creates a new reality, separates the couple out from other people for each other while connecting their marriage to every other Jewish couple and the Jewish community,” says Paul Kipnes, rabbi of Congregation Or Ami in Calabasas, Calif., and co-author of Jewish Spiritual Parenting (Jewish Lights) with his wife of 26 years, Michelle November. Even if a couple is not observant or involved Jewishly, says Kipnes, they want a Jewish wedding because “Judaism is their home and the Jewish rituals transform them.”

The Sheva Brachot, the Seven Wedding Blessings at the heart of the ceremony, encapsulate a Jewish view of the most significant values in what a marriage could and should be, says Kipnes, singling out four key words: ahava, achavah, shalom, v’re’ut: love, kinship, wholeness/peace, and friendship. “Love is both a feeling and a perspective on another person. It lifts you up, gives you energy, inspires, motivates, and warms you.” Achava (kinship), he continues, is derived from the word ach, brother – someone to whom you have a responsibility and sense of obligation through good times and bad. Re’ut signifies a friendship with someone you choose and trust, who accepts you for who you are and pushes you to be better. Shalom, from the root shalem, mirrors the wholeness and completeness that can come with marriage. The exuberant lines of the Sheva Brachot actually reverse the dark vision of the prophet Jeremiah as he watched his people exiled and Jerusalem ruined. “The prophet lamented, 'Never again will the voice of joy and gladness, the voice of bride and groom, be heard in the cities of Judah and the streets of Jerusalem.’” By replacing just two letters, the rabbis changed the phrase lo yishama (never again) to od yishama (once again), teaching that just as the Jewish people faced tragedy and survived, so a marriage can overcome dark times and revel in celebration. “For married couples, it can take just two elements – the two partners, making seemingly small changes, to transform hopelessness into hopefulness.” On a personal level, says Kipnes, he and November regard marriage as “a binding of souls, one to the other, for all eternity. That became the vision against which we measured all the challenges in life and in our JW Magazine | jwi.org/magazine

relationship. Since our souls would be bound together forever, we worked intensely to address openly and equitably whatever came our way.” A Jewish wedding “is a decision to work on living with someone in a context of committed holiness. It’s a process that weaves in family and friends, builds in a system of conscious support and amplifies lovingkindness,” says Rabbi Goldie Milgram, 61, author of eight books including Living Jewish Life Cycle: How to Create Meaningful Rites of Passage at Every Stage of Life. Milgram, who now lives in Sarasota, Fla., offers many spiritual and egalitarian options on her website, reclaimingjudaism.org. For instance, as the couple under the chuppah holds up the cup of wine, a symbol of life, health and joy, they can imagine themselves having a long life together. A mutual glass-stamping ceremony might not only represent sadness at the destruction of the Temple, but could also symbolize that the couple is breaking through from their lives as single people into the joy of marriage. The spiritual side of marriage is rooted in mysticism, says Debra Band, a Hebrew manuscript artist, author and illustrator in Potomac, Md. According to Kabbalah, at the beginning of time Divinity was shattered; the focus of the universe is bent on reuniting the qualities of the Divine (the sefirot), gathering and restoring the sparks to the whole. When a human couple comes together, they effect a piece of tikkun olam. Band experienced the healing herself when she remarried at 57 (her first husband, David Band, had died when they were both 52). She and her second husband, psychiatrist Michael Diamond, “were conscious we were 44

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doing tikkun on a personal and communal level. I’ve seen how my new marriage affects my life and the life of my kids. It healed wounds and was like a rebirth.”

ACCORDING TO KABBALAH, AT THE BEGINNING OF TIME DIVINITY WAS SHATTERED; THE FOCUS OF THE UNIVERSE IS BENT ON REUNITING THE QUALITIES OF THE DIVINE, GATHERING AND RESTORING THE SPARKS TO THE WHOLE. WHEN A HUMAN COUPLE COMES TOGETHER, THEY EFFECT A PIECE OF TIKKUN OLAM. Band notes that the traditional ketubah, the Jewish marriage contract, mirrors Judaism’s brilliance in bridging the practical and spiritual realms. “The Jewish marriage is wholly planted in this world. The spiritual element is powerful but the first function of a wedding is enacting a halachic agreement, a legal arrangement.” The traditional ketubah outlines the husband’s material and practical obligations to his wife, including his financial responsibility, in addition to protecting a woman from being tossed out penniless in case of divorce or his death. Many couples prefer to diverge from the traditional document and spend hours thinking about how to customize their ketubah to convey their indi-

vidual values and aspirations for the relationship. When Band, who has designed dozens of ketubahs, works with couples, she tries to connect their interests to Jewish tradition – no matter how assimilated they may be. “The ketubah is a doorway into their Jewish life together,” she says. She offers two original English texts of her own and often couples bring their own, written themselves or adapted from the many alternative texts around. For Melissa Curley, 28, and her husband Matthew, 25, of Long Beach, N.Y., customizing their ketubah to articulate their feelings and promises to each other was an indelible experience. “To promise someone that you will build a home together that is full of love and trust and laughter is a powerful thing, and I cry a little bit every time I read the words,” says Curley, who married in November 2015. Matthew was raised Catholic but is not as tied to his religion as Melissa is to her Jewish identity. Their wedding incorporated many Jewish customs, from her bat mitzvah tallit that hung from the poles of the chuppah to the joyous hora at the reception. “I am not a religious person, but find my roots and my identity in Jewish tradition and plan to carry this on to our children. Everything had meaning in the fact that they were the traditions and tunes I had been raised with, and it brought a wonderful sense of my deep roots, knowing that all of the generations before me had the same words and actions at their weddings in some form or another,” says Melissa, who works for a non-profit organization. “It was also the first time that Matt's family experienced this piece of my – and now our – life. They all told me afterwards how beautiful the ceremony was and how much they enjoyed hearing the tunes of the prayers.”

For David Berger, 36, cantor at KAM Isaiah Israel in Chicago, Ill., marrying his husband, Rabbi D’ror ChankinGould, in Los Angeles in 2009 felt like an act of justice. (They also had a civil ceremony just moments before Proposition 8, eliminating same-sex marriage, passed in November 2008). Though their act was bold, Berger, who was raised Reform, says that he and Chankin-Gould, “are a fairly traditional couple,” and that their wedding was the most traditional Jewish wedding his friends and family had ever seen. “People turn to me on a regular basis, thinking there is something magical that – poof! – makes a wedding gay,” says Berger. “It’s remarkable and miraculous for me that a gay wedding is just a wedding. But the communal change in saying the spiritual ritual of marriage is open to gay people suddenly makes every other piece of Jewish life open to gay people. That’s profound for me.” Berger’s wedding featured such traditional elements as separate tisches (literally, tables) for each partner – with food, drink, study, conversation, toasts and roasts. At the bedeken, the customary veiling of the bride, they helped each other don special purpleand-black wedding kippot and kittels, the white robes warn on special occasions by Ashkenazic Jews. A community of loved ones gathered to witness and participate in the celebration, “precious people from all parts of our lives” including five grandparents, teachers and best friends from childhood, Berger noted. “Honoring our values in a public and tangible way at our wedding helped reinforce and clarify them. They now serve as guiding principles that strengthen our relationship.”

Sometimes marriages don’t work out as planned, in the Conservative movement, couples generally sign a clause attached to the ketubah ensuring that, in case the marriage does not last, the husband will grant his wife a get, Jewish divorce. In the Orthodox world, however, there are situations where the husband refuses to give his wife a get. In these situations, the woman becomes chained to the man. In Hebrew, she is called an agunah. Abuse through get refusal has become an increasingly recognized problem in the Orthodox community. Signing a halachic prenuptial agreement can avert this situation. JWI has launched a program called Get Smart to educate young people about this option. The halachic prenuptial agreement, a legal document signed by the bride and groom before the wedding, can be an effective tool for preventing get abuse. However many couples do not use this document and, in some cases, husbands use the denial of a get as a means of power and control, refusing to give one unless certain conditions or financial arrangements are met.

Drawing on its experience in abuse prevention, JWI’s two-year educational program and public awareness campaign is geared towards Orthodox teens and young adults. The program, which is funded by the Aviv Foundation, will acquaint them with the issue of get abuse in Jewish marriages and will promote the use of the halachic prenuptial agreement as a tool to protect both parties from the risk of abusing or being abused through get refusal. “This document is a way for a couple to show their love and care for one another since by signing it they agree to treat each other with respect, no matter what,” says Deborah Rosenbloom, JWI vice president of programs. The halachic prenuptial agreement has been approved by Rabbinical Council of America (RCA), one of the world’s largest associations of Orthodox rabbis, and by the RCA-affiliated Bet Din of America. The latter reports a near 100 percent success rate in resolving divorces between parties who signed the agreement. JW Magazine | jwi.org/magazine

Family and community were also paramount at Rebecca Yousefzadeh Sassouni’s wedding 22 years ago. “It wasn’t just me getting married,” says Sassouni, 45, an attorney in Great Neck, N.Y. who traces her family roots to Kashan and Tehran, Iran. “We were part of a bigger picture. It’s the union of families and set the stage for the rest of my life.” To this day, she says, “it’s not just me and my husband.” The preparations leading up to the wedding were laden with Persian customs that emphasized the multi-generational, celebratory and supportive circle of women. A henna bandoon, a henna party akin to a shower, was held two weeks before the wedding. Henna, which is thought to have curative and restorative properties, is passed around for luck and the women smudge it in their palms. “It looks like icky mud but the bride is supposed to look at her hand and find her fortune hidden there. She goes around the room and shares her blessing.” In all traditions, the bride and groom traditionally dip into the transformative waters of the mikvah before the wedding. Even that ritual was shared with the community of women on 46

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the Thursday preceding Sassouni’s wedding. “I was alone in the mikvah but the minute I came out it was like a party,” she recalls. Her mother, sisters, mother- and sisters-in-law, and grandmothers had waited right outside. As soon as she put on the robe the first thing she saw was her own reflection in a mirror her mother-in-law had brought so she could view herself pure, reborn, optimistic and ready for marriage. “It was a rite of passage. I loved the purification, renewal, transitional and generational aspects.” Sassouni was still living at home with her parents before she married. As she drove away from their house for the last time before the wedding, her parents sprinkled rosewater and mint on the ground, reciting the Farsi words, jaat hameesheh sabz basheh [Your place will always be green]. Sassouni remembers it poignantly. “They were saying that there will always be a space for you here. Even though I was leaving home my presence would always be alive there. I’d always be their daughter.” When she returned from her honeymoon and entered her new home for the first time, her mother-in-law had left the same mir-

ror, a bottle of water and a container of dried rice, embodying innumerable blessings for plenty, reflection, purity and renewal. Judaism acknowledges that in some cases marriages do not last and there are contemporary versions of Jewish prenuptial agreements available. (See sidebar, page 45.) But to give the couple’s new life the best possible chance, Milgram, who is also a social worker, suggests resolving family friction and working on teshuvah, in the form of relationship healing, during the engagement year. “The more teshuvah is done, the more healthy a self and network one brings into a marriage,” she says. “Plus the habit of teshuvah is a great gift in the life of a couple.” The joy that accompanies so many weddings is part of what makes them memorable. “Most of our experience, what we see, feel and go through, is so temporally contained and filled with illusion,” says Berger. “The wedding is one of the few moments of true certainty in life that allows us to access what is real and precious.”  Rahel Musleah leads tours of Jewish India and speaks about its communities. Her website is explorejewishindia.com.

HONORABLE MENTSCHEN JWI's work to end violence against women and girls is not done alone. This is our tribute to some of the wonderful men we are proud to call allies. Our work with Jewish Women International is critical to helping our men, and students on campuses where we operate, understand how they can play a big part in ending sexual violence on campus. The team at JWI are not only true experts in this area, but also willing to experiment with new and creative programming that can catch the attention of college students. I intend to continue growing my support of JWI for many years to come.

LAURENCE BOLOTIN Zeta Beta Tau Fraternity.

is executive director of

The Jewish community and its institutions forged my identity. Yet, as I matured, I came to witness subtle and overt instances of unhealthy and even abusive relationships in the very institutions that should have been safe spaces. We need to engage in a more open and honest conversation about healthy relationships, violence against women, modern day masculinity and bystander intervention. Our synagogues, our summer camps, our youth movements ought to be shelters of peace for all. For me, that means taking on the work of prevention.

RABBI ARI S. LORGE

is co-chair of JWI’s Clergy Task Force to End Domestic Abuse in the Jewish Community and associate rabbi at Central Synagogue of Manhattan. Sexual assault is an issue that affects students on every single campus. If it affects students and you are a student leader in whatever capacity, you should stand up for what’s right. If you can change the culture with young people, those who are actually living these issues, and affect how they think and the culture behind those ideas, you can change the world. Why shouldn’t we have a voice in our future?

NICK CARR

is deputy campaign manager of Francis Rooney for U.S. Congress (District 19). He is a 2016 graduate of George Washington University, where he was president of the school's ZBT fraternity chapter and was instrumental in creating the joint JWI-ZBT project, Green Light: Go!

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n innovative JWI program for boys and men in Baltimore’s Orthodox community used Torahbased values to explore what it takes to be a mentsch. The Mensch Handbook; How to Be a Mensch on Field and Off; The Leader as Mensch; Raising Your Child to Be a Mensch. If the number of books about the topic on Amazon is any indication, people struggle with how to be a mentsch – a person of honor and integrity. “Boy to Mentsch,” a three-year pilot program completed in July in Baltimore, explored how to be a mentsch using Torah-based values. The program was coordinated by JWI in collaboration with CHANA, a Baltimore-area organization offering a Jewish community response to people who experience abuse and other interpersonal trauma. Led locally by Shmuel Fischler, LCSW-C, the director of outreach and advocacy for CHANA, this for-men-by-men program promoted open dialogue with boys, fathers, and adults working with young people. It delved into the messages society gives regarding what it means to be a man and how those messages may be contrary to the Torah’s definition of a true mentsch.

I want to be part of the solution. I want to make a difference. Boy to Mentsch is a way to help combat domestic violence in our community in a positive way. Fusing Judaism with therapeutic skills is what my life is about, and Boy to Mentsch was the perfect setting to join those passions.

RABBI OVADIAH BANDER , LGPC, is a therapist at NorthStar

Academy in Rockville, Maryland, and worked closely with the JWI team to develop and facilitate the Boy to Mentsch project curriculum.

The program was funded by a three-year grant awarded to JWI by the U.S. Department of Justice, Office on Violence Against Women, Baltimore community initiative. JWI had sought this federal funding to bring its technical leadership on these issues to the underserved religious community. The grant enabled JWI to develop a portfolio of resources for the community, including curricula for boys, workshops for fathers, and resources for coaches and camp staff, and for CHANA to implement the project. Posters from the project were displayed throughout the community. The initiative even featured a public awareness campaign in buses, on the radio, and in publications. Over the past two years, interactive exercises and workshops were held for hundreds of boys in day schools, for camp staff and campers, and for fathers and coaches. The skill sets addressed were effective communication/managing anger, conflict resolution, empathy, and being a team player. Deborah Rosenbloom, Boy to Mentsch project director and JWI’s vice president of programs, is committed to making the program resources available in other locales. “Engaging men and boys in this work is critical to ending violence against women. JWI is immensely proud of the work done in Baltimore and we hope to bring it to other Orthodox communities in the future.” To learn more about Boy to Mentsch, email drosenbloom@jwi.org.  48

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For many years I taught at a rabbinical seminary and would invite JWI’s Deborah Rosenbloom to speak to future rabbis about both their ability and responsibility to be involved with issues of domestic violence, as well as the promotion of healthy relationships. Deborah remains an important colleague, resource and inspiration to me in making these concerns an ongoing part of my rabbinic work.

RABBI RICHARD HIRSH is a member – and former co-chair – of JWI’s Clergy Task Force to End Domestic Abuse in the Jewish Community, and serves as a part-time associate rabbi at two Reform congregations in the Philadelphia area.

LEADERSHIP Though being honored as JWI Women to Watch Community Leader in 2007 was VIVIAN G. BASS's first encounter with JWI, the organization's mission – safe homes, healthy relationships, strong women – resonated with her. She joined JWI's board of trustees in 2011, subsequently served as vice-chair, and has now been elected chair. Bass took over the volunteer leadership in June, just before she retired after 30 years as CEO of the Jewish Foundation for Group Homes (JFGH). “Since I was honored in 2007, I’ve had dual passions,” Bass says. “Year after year, JWI became more significant in my life.” At JFGH Bass oversaw all facets of the organization, which serves adults with disabilities in the Washington, D.C. area. She has mentored more than 25 communities worldwide wishing to emulate JFGH’s various service delivery models.

ELLEN STONE of New York, N.Y., executive vice president of marketing at Bravo and Oxygen Media, has now stepped up as vice chair of JWI's board. "It is an honor to work with JWI on meaningful initiatives around women's issues, from helping to prevent domestic violence to a focus on financial literacy to ensuring the next generation carries on these important causes through our Young Women's Leadership Network. This organization has gone to the heart of these issues."

KIM OSTER HOLSTEIN of Chicago, Ill., a philanthropist and entrepreneur, is stepping down as chair but will remain on the JWI board as immediate past chair. “It has been an honor to chair this inspiring organization. I want to continue to be a voice and ambassador for JWI in the areas I can impact – the Young Women's Leadership Network; initiatives to prevent sexual assault; financial literacy; and empowering women to know that they can pave a path for their futures with entrepreneurship.”

Raised in Pittsburgh, Bass grew up in a Reform Jewish home and describes her years in the youth group B’nai B’rith Girls as “a powerful and motivating influence.” She received undergraduate and graduate degrees in special education from the University of Michigan and began her career as an educator. While working for the Board of Jewish Education of Greater Washington, she pioneered the teaching of group bar/bat mitzvah classes for students with disabilities. Prior to joining JFGH in 1986, she coordinated the special-needs adult and camping programs at the JCC of Greater Washington. “When I was starting out professionally, there weren’t really mentors available,” Bass says. “As a result, I am passionate about JWI’s work with young leaders, making it possible for them to find mentors and feel a sense of validation. Helping women and girls live empowered lives is something I’m very serious about.”

JULIE BENDER SILVER of Bethesda, Md. is JWI's newest board member. She is president of the Bender Foundation, the first recipient of JWI’s Community Leadership Award, and creator of JWI’s Sondra D. Bender Community Leadership Institute. "I love the JWI programs that bring young women into the organization. The Young Women's Leadership Network speaks to the future of substantive programming, mentoring and networking opportunities for women in their twenties and thirties."

SANDY UNGER of Eagan, Minn., is stepping down after more than 30 years of JWI leadership – including 12 years on the board, three of them as chair and two as international president. CEO Lori Weinstein says: “Sandy has been a foundational anchor for JWI for more than 30 years. With her dedicated leadership and passion for JWI’s mission and work, she has helped lead the organization through its successful and innovative transition from B’nai B’rith Women to JWI.” JW Magazine | jwi.org/magazine

Where the

Vegetables are the Stars In the hands of inventive chefs, homely vegetables go from simple sides to sophisticated centers of the plate. BY JAYNE COHEN

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t was a Cinderella moment: a humble cabbage—usually the stuff of slaws and boiled bubbe food— utterly transformed, caramelized with wood smoke and elegantly surrounded by a creamy muhammara of red peppers, pomegranate, tahini, and crunchy hazelnuts. Yes, the chicken was outrageously good, and the just-baked pillows of fluffy pita thoroughly irresistible even to the staunchest carbophobe. But the March night I ate at the Israeli restaurant Shaya in New Orleans, winner of the 2016 James Beard award for Best New Restaurant in the U.S., I knew at first bite that, for me, that luscious cabbage was belle of this ball. They’ve been dubbed vegetable whisperers, Shaya and other chefs known for taking even homely vegetables like Brussels sprouts, broccoli and butternut squash out of the wings and into the spotlight. Such foods are not always meatless: some chefs may cast a protein in a minor role. But even when lamb bacon embellishes a sizzling rotisserie-roasted celery root or a golden egg yolk sets off a shocking pink “beet tartare,” the vegetable stays the sexy star. And it’s no secret that many of the finest of these chefs have Israeli roots or make use of techniques and ingredients – condiments like labneh, pomegranate molasses, tahini and date syrup; spices from Aleppo pepper to za’atar – popularized by Israelis. Even Paris and Vienna now boast outposts of Tel Aviv’s Miznon, the restaurant where Eyal Shani’s wood-roasted whole baby cauliflowers and blistered broccoli seduce vegetarians and meateaters alike. And in fact, Alon Shaya, the chef and co-owner of that eponymous restaurant in New Orleans, was channeling loving memories of his Bulgarian-Israeli grandmother’s

stuffed cabbage when he created his roasted version. “Israelis love their vegetables. They treat their vegetables the way Americans treat meat: marinating them, grilling them, roasting them low and slow,” Michael Solomonov tells me. Solomonov, who, with his business partner, Steven Cook, coauthored Zahav: A World of Israeli Cooking, the 2016 James Beard Book of the Year, should know. In Philadelphia at his celebrated Israeli restaurant, Zahav, he marinates steamed mushrooms with allspice before grilling them so that they taste like Israeli shishlik. And his all-time favorite eggplant preparation calls for frying the eggplant until dark chocolate brown, but still creamy within, and then frying it once more with vinegar, onions, and peppers until it turns, he writes, “sweet, sour, and smoky.” Shaya explains that Israelis, who came from “many cultures that were poor and that hadn’t always had access to fresh seafood and meat,” made use of the abundant vegetables available to them. They found creative “ways to feed their families with food they could grow at low-cost and with high yields, like cabbage and eggplant.” While it’s been a process evolving “for years and generations,” today, he notes, “the complexity of the vegetable dishes Israelis cook shows that vegetable cooking is more than just steamed broccoli or peas and carrots.” Creating that complexity, it turns out, is the difference between a simple

side dish and a sophisticated center of the plate. Reimagine that plain broccoli as Amanda Cohen, chefowner of Dirt Candy on Manhattan’s Lower East Side, does: grilled and smoked, her broccoli morphs into “broccoli dogs” served with broccoli kraut and mustard barbecue sauce. She recasts common carrots into tony carrot sliders: soft, carrotinflected sesame buns enveloping slow-roasted carrot confit, pickles, onions, and hoisin sauce, with crispy yuba (tofu skin) added for texture. I ask Cohen, whose popular restaurant relaunched last year in larger digs, why building all those layers of flavor and textures is so important. “Vegetables are very uni-textured,” she says. “Think of a steak. The meat has so many flavors and textures: the sear and char, tender, juicy center, spicy crust. So you don’t need to add different points of flavor.” But, as she makes clear in Dirt Candy, her cookbook written in graphic novel form, “For vegetables, you need to go big or go home”: don’t be timid about ramping up the flavor and find ways to incorporate a variety of textures. So forget simple steaming, poaching, and boiling. Veg-centric chefs are coaxing out more flavor with brasher methods: charring and smoking, brining and blasting, slow-roasting and sous-vide cooking, even dehydrating or deep-frying the vegetable peels. “A lot of chefs use the great trick of highlighting an ingredient by using

The holidays of Rosh Hashanah, traditionally the anniversary of Creation, and Sukkot, the biggest of the seasonal harvest festivals, make this a time of year when we are conscious of our role as stewards of the natural world. Our “vegetable whisperer” chefs are keenly aware that real appreciation and gratitude for the earth’s bounty begin by not wasting it. They honor the earth by practicing root-to-stem cooking. Recipes at jwi.org/magazine. JW Magazine | jwi.org/magazine

To make a dish that sings in different notes of zucchini, Michael Solomonov roasts trimmed zucchini slices and tosses them with dressing. Instead of discarding the trimmed zucchini ends, he roasts them until nearly blackened, then purées them with tahini, anchovies, and lemon. To serve, he pools that umami-rich purée on a platter, and drapes it with the roasted zucchini slices, feta, and hazelnuts.

Alon Shaya

Amelia Saltsman

Using vegetables this way multiplies flavors and textures, adds dimension, and creates a dish greater than the sum of its parts, Koslow points out. “That balancing act of acid, of salt, of heft, really gets people interested and keeps them going” without palatefatigue setting in. Vegetable-driven cuisine, of course, starts with fresh, seasonal vegetables. Shaya finds inspiration in the “great Louisiana farms producing all year round some of the best vegetables you can get.” The seeds for Sqirl began with the leftovers Koslow tinkered with from the Hollywood Farmers’ Market. “I fell in love with the beauty and diversity of California produce,” she writes. And early in 2017, in a still-to-be named restaurant in West Los Angeles, Koslow will blend that love for fresh produce with another area she is passionate about: Jewish Dias-

52Jessica Koslow JW Magazine | jwi.org/magazine

pora flavors. There she will combine Ashkenazi and Sephardi cuisines “in a way where they aren’t separate but merge... a conversation of differences,” as she explains it to me, where handfuls of her market-fresh Middle Eastern herbs, like Moroccan mint, might “brighten and bring enormous flavor to dishes from our past, such as carrot and prune tzimmes.” For Amelia Saltsman, the Southern California farmers’ markets – especially in Santa Monica, where she lives – serve as wellsprings for her culinary story. “Although I’m an omnivore, the produce is the most exciting component for me because that’s where you’ll find the greatest diversity and variety. And all those colors! How many kinds of meat are there and how different can one piece of meat be from another?” she asks. Take cauliflower, a darling of the vegetable-forward movement, which, Saltsman writes in The Seasonal Jewish Kitchen: A Fresh Take on Tradition, “lends itself to multiple Jewish Diaspora profiles.” To illustrate, she offers two distinct versions that begin with a brief bath in boiling salted water (and she explains why this is the secret to luscious roasted cauliflower). Then she roasts one with ghee, a curry blend, and raisins for a taste of Jewish India. The other, she sears with hawaij, a Yemenite spice blend, and tops with tahini and sea salt, giving it an unmistakably Israeli passport. Amanda Cohen – who calls Dirt Candy “an all-vegetable restaurant” because the focus is on delicious vegetables, not simply vegetarian cooking – agrees. “I realized early on how much more you could do with vegetables than a piece of protein. It opened up my world as a chef. And they’re a lot more fun. I try to make eating

top to bottom, photos by: Graham Blackall, Patricia Williams, Jaime Beecham

it in two different ways within the same dish,” Jessica Koslow writes in Everything I Want to Eat Now: Sqirl and the New California Cooking, the new cookbook that grew out of her wildly successful produce-driven restaurant, Sqirl, in Silver Lake, Los Angeles, where she serves breakfast and lunch only. “If you’re making a beet salad, you could emulsify some of the beets and use them in the dressing.” Or, she tells me, “you could add the beet roasting juices to the dressing.”

The Takeaway: Try These Chef-Tested Techniques vegetables a joy.” And in her sly, playful riffs – like creating “fried calamari” by stamping rings out of mushrooms – she is trying, she says, “to recreate that same joy we had at table eating big Jewish family holiday meals” growing up in Toronto. Joy is palpable in the riot of colors and flavors that vegetables bring to our fall holiday table. As Rosh Hashanah approaches, I’m concentrating on which of them I’ll be serving as part of the festive New Year table rituals when eating symbolic foods becomes an edible prayer: Michael Solomonov’s beets with tahini convey a food pun imploring that we “beat back those who would do us harm,” their sweetness signifying we should know no sadness; the deep gold of Amanda Cohen’s Grilled Carrot Paella is evocative of coins, and therefore of good fortune; Jessica Koslow’s savory pancakes are made with squash, one of the vegetables that grow in profusion at this time of year, suggesting a fruitfulness that translates into hopes for a year filled with an abundance of joy and prosperity. There may be brisket on the table, but these vegetables are taking center stage. After all, they will be embodying our very best wishes for the New Year.  Jayne Cohen is author of Jewish Holiday Cooking: A Food Lover’s Treasury of Classics and Improvisations, a 2009 James Beard finalist, and The Gefilte Variations: 200 Inspired Recreations of Classics from the Jewish Kitchen.

AMANDA COHEN “If you're roasting, leave it in longer than you think you should so that the vegetables release their sugars and caramelize completely.” That will create different textures and bring out both sweetness and savoriness. (from Dirt Candy) “Standard stocks really add nothing,” Cohen says. Instead, she makes quick stocks based on whatever vegetable is highlighted in the dish. Her carrot stock, made simply of carrots and aromatics (onion, garlic, and celery) is simmered for just 30 minutes; her carrot risotto cooked in that stock along with a little added fresh carrot juice brims with deep, richly satisfying carrot flavors. JESSICA KOSLOW ”I'm a big fan of schmears,” Koslow says. “That comes from being a bageland-lox kind of gal and seeing that there should be a base before the protein. It doesn't have to be cream cheese or labneh or puréed legumes [like hummus]. It could be puréed beets with poppy seeds folded in or a cauliflower ganoush.” Her recipe, “Tomato Party,” begins with a tomato schmear base and continues with cherry tomatoes, whipped feta and garlic chips. And it follows the Sqirl formula for flexible eating: component building blocks such as dairy, fish, meat, etc. can be switched out or added in, so the dish will suit any dietary restrictions. For a quick alternative to her homemade toasted rice or quinoa, Koslow suggests in her new book, Everything I Want to Eat Now, using Indian puffed rice cereal to add a layer of crunch to a vegetable-focused dish. AMELIA SALTSMAN Saltsman emphasizes that cooking with a lot of liquid dilutes the flavor of vegetables. Traditionally, prepared stuffed vegetables are filled “and then baked or simmered on top of the stove in a lot of sauce,” she notes. “Instead, to intensify the flavor, I love to first roast the vegetables to caramelize the natural sugars, concentrate the juices, and evaporate a lot of the liquid. Then, I stuff them and roast in the oven. It all takes less time than a long simmering in sauce, so the result is vibrant and bright, rather than a stewed taste and texture.” “To develop deep layers of flavor in vegetables cooked on top of the stove, don't just throw raw vegetables in water and expect a miracle. Start with a good sauté, and get it really going before you add any liquid. Then add only half of the liquid called for, and let it merge and coalesce before slowly adding more liquid as needed.” MICHAEL SOLOMONOV Solomonov is partial to slow-roasted sweet potatoes for the fall. But, he says, “that method of oven on low and simply roasting on a sheet pan for an extra-long time really applies to any root vegetable...It's the marriage of a few key ingredients: a little bit of Shabbat, a little bit of schmaltz.” And perhaps sprinkle on a touch of turmeric: In Zahav, he writes, “To me, it makes root vegetables taste more like themselves.” ALON SHAYA “Keep vegetables as whole as possible, and they will make a big impression on your guests.” At Domenica, one of the three restaurants in New Orleans where he is executive chef and partner, Shaya's signature cauliflower is presented as a whole roasted head, with a steak knife rakishly plunged into its sizzling crown. ”All vegetables are created equally and have the same potential to impress when treated right. Get out of your comfort zone and cook vegetables using different techniques than you have been and I promise you will be hooked.”

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Carrot Risotto with Carrot Ribbons The gorgeous gold and orange colors in this celebration of carrots—one of the symbolic vegetables on the Rosh Hashanah table—are reminiscent of sunshine and coins, and therefore of good fortune. Amanda Cohen writes, “A lot of what folks consider the taste of a vegetable is really its texture. Remove the texture, and your tongue gets confused. This risotto is all about changing the texture of a vegetable to see how that changes its taste.” A tangle of crunchy carrot ribbons add a lovely dimension and are easy to make, but you can simplify preparations by substituting store-bought carrot chips. For a dairy-free or vegan meal, omit the butter and Parmesan. Serves 4 INGREDIENTS:

DIRECTIONS:

For the carrot stock

Make the Carrot Stock

• 4 cups sliced carrots

1. Put all of the ingredients in a large pot with 8 cups of water. Bring to a boil over medium heat, reduce the heat, and simmer for 30 minutes.

• 1 cup roughly chopped onion • 3 garlic cloves, chopped • 1 cup sliced celery

• ½ cup cornstarch

2. Strain and let cool. Freeze for up to three months or store in the fridge for up to one week. (Makes 6 cups.)

• Canola oil for deep frying

Prepare the carrot ribbons

For the carrot ribbons • 2 carrots

For the risotto • ¼ cup extra virgin olive oil • 1 cup diced yellow onion • 1 tablespoon minced garlic • 2 cups arborio rice • ⅓ cup white wine • 1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice • 1 cup carrot juice • ¼ cup diced carrot • 3 tablespoons unsalted butter • 5 tablespoons grated Parmesan, optional • 1 tablespoon fresh thyme leaves • Salt

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3. Use a vegetable peeler to make ribbons from the carrots. Toss them in cornstarch, and deep-fry them quickly, just until they hold their shape. (The ribbons can be served at room temperature.) Make the risotto 4. In a small pot over medium heat, simmer the Carrot Stock. 5. In another pan, warm the oil over medium heat. Drop in a single bit of diced onion and when it starts to sizzle, the oil is ready. Add the rest of the onions, and cook, stirring, until translucent. Add the garlic, and cook, stirring, until garlic is very soft. Add the rice and cook, stirring, until it’s translucent,

about 7 minutes. Add the wine and stir until it has evaporated, about 2 minutes. Add the lemon juice and stir until it, too, has evaporated, about 1 minute. 6. Add 1 cup of the simmering Carrot Stock to the hot rice (both need to be the same temperature). Stir until it’s absorbed, about 5 minutes. Continue adding stock 1 cup at a time and stirring until it’s absorbed. When you have 2 cups stock left, pour the carrot juice into the simmering stock, and let it come back up to a simmer. Add 1 cup of the stock-juice mixture to the rice and cook until it’s absorbed. Add the diced carrots to the rice, and then add the last 2 cups stock, 1 cup at a time. 7. When the rice looks wet and juicy, but there’s no liquid sloshing around, add the butter, 3 tablespoons Parmesan (if using), thyme, and salt to taste; stir until the butter is melted. Divide among 4 plates. 8. To serve, sprinkle with the remaining Parmesan and top with the carrot ribbons.

Adapted from Dirt Candy: A Cookbook by Amanda Cohen, Ryan Dunlavey, and Grady Hendrix, published by Clarkson Potter

Grilled Mushrooms Grilled mushrooms can easily take the place of meat in a meal, but all too often they wind up leathery-tasting or utterly bland. Michael Solomonov’s technique solves both problems. Starting with meaty king trumpets (also known as king oyster or trumpet royale mushrooms), creminis, or any firm mushroom—even large white button mushrooms—he briefly steams them “to keep them from drying out.” He then imbues them with all the flavor of an Israeli shishlik by, he writes, “marinating them in onion, parsley, and allspice (it’s the allspice that really makes them taste like meat) and then putting them on the grill.” If, like me, you don’t have access to a barbecue, the mushrooms are also terrific cooked in a searing hot cast-iron stovetop grill pan. Serves 4 INGREDIENTS:

DIRECTIONS:

• 1 pound (about 8) king trumpet or other hefty mushrooms

1. Preheat the oven to 350°F. Season the mushrooms with the salt, toss with the oil, and arrange in a baking dish. Add enough water to cover the bottom of the dish and cover the dish tightly with two layers of foil. Bake until the mushrooms are just tender, about 30 minutes. Let them cool in their liquid, then drain and reserve the liquid.

• 1 teaspoon kosher salt • 2 tablespoons olive oil • 1½ cups roughly chopped onions • ½ cup roughly chopped fresh parsley • ¼ cup roughly chopped fresh chives • ½ teaspoon ground allspice

2. Combine the mushroom cooking liquid with the onions, parsley, chives, and allspice in a blender. Puree until smooth. Put the mushrooms in a zip-top bag, cover with the marinade, and seal. Refrigerate for at least 4 hours or up to 3 days. 3. To grill the mushrooms: Thread on skewers, wiping away any excess marinade. Grill directly over hot coals until the exteriors are lightly charred, about 3 minutes.

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Roasted Cabbage with Muhamarra and Tahini Every bite of this cabbage is an explosion of dramatic flavors and layers of texture. Lightly charred outside and melt-inyour-mouth tender within, it is meant to be eaten scooped up with the creamy, spicy muhamarra, rich with roasted red pepper and tomatoes, and subtly nutty from hazelnuts and a tahini drizzle. At his eponymous restaurant Shaya, Chef Alon Shaya first cooks the cabbage sous-vide, then caramelizes it in a wood-burning oven. In this home cook’s version that he developed for JW, he notes that "basically, this combination of poaching and then roasting in the oven at high heat will give the same effect as the sous vide version we use at the restaurant.” Serves about 8 INGREDIENTS: For the cabbage

For the muhamarra

For the tahini sauce

• 6½ cups cold water

• 1¾ cups extra virgin olive oil

• 1 cup lemon juice

• 2⅓ cups white wine

• I yellow onion, shaved thin

• 4 cloves unpeeled garlic

• 4 tablespoons kosher salt

• 6 cloves garlic, minced

• 1⅔ cups raw tahini

• 1 whole bay leaf

• 1 tablespoon salt

• ⅓ cup ice water

• Juice of one lemon

• 3 tablespoons Aleppo pepper

• 1 tablespoon salt

• 4 teaspoons crushed red chili flakes

• 1 teaspoon ground cumin

• Coarse sea salt and extra virgin olive oil for serving

• 2½ teaspoons granulated sugar

• 1 teaspoon smoked paprika

• 2 tablespoons butter, unsalted • 6 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil • 2 heads of cabbage, cut into quarters

• 1 teaspoon ground coriander • ½ cup white wine vinegar • 1 can whole, peeled tomatoes (28 ounces) • 6 whole roasted red peppers, diced • ½ pound hazelnuts, skinless • 1 teaspoon pomegranate molasses

DIRECTIONS: Prepare the muhamarra 1. Heat ¼ cup olive oil in a large saucepan. Add the onions, garlic, and salt, and cook until opaque. Add 1 tablespoon Aleppo pepper, the cumin, coriander, and paprika. Stir for one minute and deglaze with the vinegar. Reduce the vinegar until almost dry, then add the tomatoes and roasted peppers. Reduce the heat to low and stir constantly to cook most of the water out until mixture resembles a paste. While cooking, smash the tomatoes with a spoon to release the juice. Remove from heat and cool to room temperature. Toast the hazelnuts in a 350°F oven for 10 minutes until golden brown, and let cool. 2. In a food processor, combine the hazelnuts, roasted pepper mixture, remaining 2 tablespoons Aleppo pepper, 1½ cups olive oil, and pomegranate molasses. The mixture should emulsify into a thick paste. If it doesn't fully emulsify, refrigerate it for one hour, then whip with a whisk in a mixing bowl. Make the tahini sauce 3. Crush the unpeeled garlic cloves with a knife and place in a blender with the lemon juice. Blend on highest setting for 3 minutes. Once blended, let mixture rest for 30 minutes, then strain through fine mesh strainer. Place tahini in a stand mixer with whip attachment and whip for 5 minutes on high speed, adding ⅔ cup of the garlic-lemon juice slowly while whipping the tahini. Next, slowly add the ice water and salt. Occasionally stop the mixer and scrape the bowl with a rubber spatula to ensure even mixing. Thin the sauce with additional ¼ cup cold water if necessary. 56

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Recipe courtesy of Chef Alon Shaya of Shaya Restaurant, New Orleans. Photo by Randy Schmidt.

Prepare the cabbage 4. Preheat oven to 550Â°F, or its highest setting. In a 4-quart saucepan, combine all the ingredients along with the cabbage. Place on medium heat and bring to simmer. Cook for approximately 15 minutes or until you can easily insert a knife through the center. You want to be careful not to overcook it, or it will fall apart when you try to remove it from the pan. Using a slotted spoon, carefully remove the cabbage from the poaching liquid and arrange on a baking sheet. Roast until golden all over the top. To serve, drizzle with a little coarse sea salt, extra virgin olive oil, and tahini sauce, and spoon a generous pool of the muhamarra alongside.

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Vegetable Socca (chickpea flour

pancakes made with your choice of zucchini, carrot, or winter squash)

Imagine latkes spending the fall in the south of France and you’ve captured the taste of Jessica Koslow’s pancakes. Prepared with colorful grated vegetables and thickened with a little chickpea flour, they are packed with fragrant fresh herbs and savory spices. Topped with tart greens and creamy labneh, these pancakes make a center-of-theplate (and gluten-free) treat any time; on Rosh Hashanah, they’re also a delicious way to showcase one or more of the symbolic vegetables. For a dairy-free version, fry in oil instead of butter and omit the labneh. Serves 4 INGREDIENTS: • 1 pound (455 g) zucchini, carrot, or winter squash (see Notes), peeled and coarsely grated • Fine sea salt • ¼ teaspoon cumin seeds • ¼ teaspoon coriander seeds • ¼ teaspoon fennel seeds • 4 large eggs • 1 clove garlic, minced • 1 tablespoon chopped fresh oregano • 2 tablespoons chopped fresh mint • 3 tablespoons chopped fresh cilantro

DIRECTIONS: 1. Toss the grated vegetable with a few big pinches of salt, then put it in a fine-mesh sieve and let drain, squeezing every so often so that the vegetable releases its water, for at least 15 minutes. 2. Meanwhile, combine the cumin, coriander, and fennel seeds in a dry skillet over medium-low heat. Toast the spices, shaking the pan often, until fragrant but not burned, about 3 minutes. Using a mortar and pestle or a spice grinder, grind the toasted spices to a powder. 3. Crack the eggs into a large bowl and whisk to break them up. Add the drained vegetables, along with the garlic, oregano, mint, cilantro, chickpea flour, and toasted spices. Season with ½ teaspoon salt and a few grinds of black pepper, and mix well. If you are using winter squash, stir in a pinch each of ground cinnamon and ground ginger. (The pancake batter can be made up to 2 days ahead and stored, covered, in the fridge.) 4. Heat a large skillet, preferably cast iron, over mediumhigh heat for a minute or two. Add the butter, then spoon in two overflowing ½ cupfuls (120 ml) of the pancake batter, pressing each to ½ inch (12 mm) thick. Cook, rotating the skillet occasionally for even browning, until the pancakes are nicely browned. Flip, then cook the second side for another few minutes. Transfer the pancakes to a plate. Repeat to make two more pancakes, adding more butter to the skillet, if needed.

• ⅔ cup (80 g) chickpea flour

5. Season the labneh with salt.

• Freshly ground black pepper

6. Just before serving, toss the greens with the lemon juice, oil, and some salt and pepper. Top each socca pancake with a huge dollop of labneh and a tangle of greens.

• Pinch of ground cinnamon (optional; use with winter squash) • Pinch of ground ginger (optional; use with winter squash) • 2 tablespoons unsalted butter, plus more as needed • ½ cup (120 ml) labneh • 3 cups (60 g) spicy greens (such as watercress, arugula, or baby mustard greens) • 1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice • 1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil

NOTE ON THE WINTER SQUASH You can use any kind of winter squash that you like. We usually go for kabocha. If you’re having a hard time grating the squash on one of those handheld box graters, try cutting the squash into 2-inch (5-cm) pieces and then shredding them in a food processor. WANT TO MAKE IT HEARTIER? Add a fried egg on top. SPICE UP THE LABNEH Have fun with the seasoning. Try mixing in ras el hanout or za’atar.

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Reprinted with permission from Everything I Want to Eat by Jessica Koslow; ABRAMS Fall 2016. Photo credit: Jaime Beecham

Roasted Brussels Sprouts with Walnuts, Pomegranate Molasses and Shanklish Amelia Saltsman’s alluring recipe, rich with autumn flavors and textural contrast, is a wonderful addition to the table on Rosh Hashanah, Sukkot, and throughout the season. She writes, “I like to dip the warm Brussels sprouts into the cool shanklish (thick labneh seasoned with za’atar and Aleppo pepper), but you can also thin the topping with a little olive oil to make it more like a dressing.” For a pareve/vegan version, serve without the shanklish. Serves 6 to 8 INGREDIENTS: • 2 pounds (900 g) small-to-medium Brussels sprouts, halved lengthwise • 2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil • Kosher or sea salt and freshly ground black pepper • 4 tablespoons (60 ml) pomegranate molasses • 1 cup (100 g) walnut halves, toasted • 1 cup (225 g) Shanklish (recipe follows) DIRECTIONS: 1. Position a rack in the upper third of the oven and preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C). 2. Boil the Brussels sprouts in salted water or steam them over salted water until crisp-tender, about 3 minutes. Drain and dry thoroughly on paper towels or dish towels. (This step can be done a day ahead; store covered in the refrigerator.) On a large baking sheet, toss the sprouts with the olive oil, season them with salt and pepper, and spread them evenly over the baking sheet. 3. Roast the Brussels sprouts, shaking the pan halfway through the cooking, until they are tender, browned in places, and any loose leaves are crisped, about 35 minutes. Remove the pan from the oven, drizzle 2 tablespoons of the molasses over the sprouts, toss, and return the sprouts to the oven for about 5 minutes to glaze. 4. Remove from the oven and scrape the Brussels sprouts and any juices onto a serving platter. Scatter the walnuts over and around the sprouts, season with additional salt, and drizzle with the remaining 2 tablespoons molasses. Top with a large dollop or two of Shanklish and serve the remaining sauce in a bowl alongside.

Shanklish INGREDIENTS: • 2 cups (450 g) labneh, homemade or store-bought • 1 tablespoon za’atar • Leaves from 6 thyme sprigs, chopped or crushed • ½ to 1 teaspoon Aleppo pepper • ½ to 1 teaspoon kosher salt DIRECTIONS: In a bowl, combine the labneh, za’atar, thyme, ½ teaspoon Aleppo pepper, and ½ teaspoon salt and stir to mix. Let stand for at least 30 minutes before serving. Taste and adjust with more Aleppo pepper and salt if needed. The shanklish will keep refrigerated for up to 3 days.

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RUNNING AWAY ayle Forman shrugs off the distinctions between writing for young adults and writing for adults. “It’s the same process, draft by draft, excavating an emotional truth,” says the bestselling author of I Was Here, Just One Day and other novels including If I Stay, which was made into a major motion picture. She has just published her first volume of fiction for adults, Leave Me (Algonquin Books). “I write about young people, but I don’t write young stories,” she says, of her earlier books. In Leave Me, she writes for the first time about the challenges of marriage. Maribeth Klein is one of those people who seems to have it all—family life with twins in Manhattan’s Tribeca, an interesting job at a magazine, a loving husband—but she seems to have it all on her shoulders. It’s an uneasy balance that needs to be constantly tended and rearranged—and it seems like one more thing might make everything topple. She’s so busy with getting her kids off to pre-school and organizing their play dates and speech therapy appointments, while meeting her deadlines at work, that she doesn’t realize that the odd and painful sensations in her chest are a heart attack. At 44, she ends up having emergency bypass surgery. For a brief time in the hospital, she can’t get to her “to do” list. As Forman writes, “She felt almost tearfully grateful to be off the hook, and residually angry because she was always on the hook.” She’s discharged before she’s remotely ready, and soon she’s in charge again, once more on the hook. Instead of getting the help she needs to

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FROM TO-DO LISTS In her first novel for adults, bestselling youngadult novelist Gayle Forman cuts to the heart of working moms’ struggles. BY SANDEE BRAWARSKY

heal, she’s needed to help her kids, husband, mother and friends. Some weeks later, Maribeth lives out what for many women is a fantasy: She leaves. Forman says that the idea of running away from it all is a universal fantasy among the mothers she knows. One fantasizes about just staying on the train, past her stop, and another considers driving right past her exit. It’s not just the running away, but it’s about going to some place of privacy, the proverbial room of one’s own, without schedules and pick-ups and meals to be prepared. Among other things, Maribeth seeks out her birth mother. “I wanted to talk about it, to remove some of the shame. To be brutally honest,” Forman says. “You can love your children and your family. You can be grateful for the riches bestowed upon you. And you can still have days that you want to leave altogether.” In person, Forman is warm, energetic, thoughtful and very open about her own experience as a wife and mother of two daughters, the younger adopted from Ethiopia. “Demographically, Maribeth and I are the same. It felt like I was shining a spotlight on myself. That’s less obvious when I’m writing about 20-year olds.”

photo by Stomping Ground Photo

As she does in her books for young people, Forman writes about intimate issues that matter to her characters, in a strong but never preachy voice. In previous books, she has focused on grief, suicide, romance and family struggles. For Forman, the emotional directness of teens is appealing, and she appreciates that they don’t necessarily erect walls around themselves the way many adults do. She knows the young adult audience well, dating back to the beginnings of her media career, when she worked at Seventeen magazine. Throughout Leave Me, Forman is very good at capturing the nuances of how people speak and what they say (and what they leave unsaid). One part of the story unfolds through an email exchange. “I love writing dialogue,” she says. “It’s my favorite part. I wrote about having kids for the first time and it was delightful. I learned to write dialogue from being a journalist and spending a lot of time listening to people talk. I can hear the characters really clearly.” Long after she finishes her books, she admits, she still hears the voices of her characters in her head, very clearly.

Readers will be nodding at how Forman just gets it right— the yearnings, the complicated love, the small disappointments, the exhaustion, the unrecognized frustrations, the unbalanced balance of gender roles, how the arguments that couples have about laundry are really about something else. Forman first began thinking about this story several years ago when she was away with her family visiting friends for a weekend, and she began worrying that the pains in her chest were related to her heart (indeed, her mother had quadruple bypass at 48). Trying to hide her pain from the others, she found herself worrying about who would take care of the kids should anything happen to her. And, not unrelated, who would take care of her? Fortunately, her heart was fine, and she put the idea aside, wrote two young adult novels, and then she began thinking again of the heart idea, about the working mother too busy with responsibilities at home and at work, and worrying about everything else in between, to notice that she was having a heart attack. One of the underlying themes of the novel is forgiveness, a timely one for the upcoming High Holiday season. In fact, Forman says that every one of her book is in some way about forgiveness. “Yom Kippur is my favorite holiday. What a great thing to have a period of time to contemplate the gap between who you are and who you want to be. I’m always very inspired.” Forman and her family are members of a non-denominational synagogue in lower Manhattan; they mark Shabbat and the Jewish holidays, and they will celebrate the bat mitzvah of each daughter. In their circle are many other intermarried couples. After attending day school in California, where she grew up, she had what she calls a “big break” from Judaism. About 10 years later, she was pulled to return when a historian friend wanted to host a Passover Seder, and she participated fully, gradually understanding how much Judaism informed who she was. “Maribeth is Jewish the way I’m Jewish,” Forman says, noting that all of her books have Jewish characters. “Her fears are probably universal, but she’s Jewishly neurotic in the best of ways.” Forman says that she sees Maribeth “every day of life, not just in myself but in women all around, when they are written off or underappreciated.”  Sandee Brawarsky is an award-winning journalist and essayist. She is the culture editor for the New York Jewish Week.

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womenworthknowing The women in these books â&#x20AC;&#x201C; real and fictional â&#x20AC;&#x201C; seek understanding and self-realization on journeys that take us in fascinating directions. BY SUE TOMCHIN

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eaving Lucy Pear takes place on rocky Cape Ann, and in nearby Gloucester, Mass. (birthplace of author Anna Solomon), during the Prohibition Era 1920s. That’s where Beatrice Haven, the daughter of a wealthy Jewish industrialist, has gone to care for an ailing uncle. It’s also where ten years before she abandoned her out-of-wedlock infant daughter. Expected to give the infant to an orphanage so she could go on to study music and marry her fiancé, she instead leaves the baby under a tree in her uncle’s orchard. Emma Murphy, the mother of a large Irish Catholic family who has come there to pick pears, adopts the baby, dubbed Lucy Pear. Ten years later, none of Beatrice’s plans have come to fruition and her emotional life is in turmoil. Brought together by chance, Bea and Emma begin to build a strained friendship and ultimately to face the impact of their choices on themselves and the daughter they share. The central events of As Close to Us as Breathing by Elizabeth Poliner, which came out earlier this year, take place in the late 1940s at Bagel Beach, a Jewish summer colony in Woodlawn, Conn. That’s where three sisters – Ada, Vivie and Bec – have returned each summer since childhood, and now with their children and husbands. Poliner sensitively captures the blend of abiding love and old hurts characterizing sibling relationships; the constrictions of traditional female roles; and the pressure of family and religious expectations vs. personal desires. But all these feelings are pushed to the background when Davy, the youngest child of one of the sisters, is accidentally killed. The tragedy frays family ties and upends the lives of the characters, including that of the narrator, 12-year-old Molly, who witnesses the accident. Can Molly, draw

from her Aunt Bec’s hard-won wisdom and free herself from the burden of grief and memory? Though Mischling, the new novel by Affinity Konar, is set during the Holocaust, it is extraordinary for the beauty and lyricism of its language and its affecting, tender moments despite the horrific setting: the “Zoo,” the area in Auschwitz where Nazi physician Josef Mengele experimented on hundreds of sets of twins. This is a debut novel for Konor who was awed by the twins who survived and managed to grow up and lead meaningful lives. Many of the characters in the book are inspired by real characters. But how Konor tells the story is her own remarkable creation. The imaginative, resilient twins, Pearl and Stasha, so close they feel each other’s pain and finish each other’s sentences, relate their story in alternate chapters. With poignancy and poetry, Konor tells a heartrending, yet ultimately transcendent tale. The lingering trauma of the Holocaust informs Flying Couch, a coming-ofage graphic memoir by Amy Kurzweil, a writer and artist whose comics have appeared in The New Yorker and The Huffington Post. Kurzweil interweaves her own quest for identity with the stories of her mother, a psychologist, and her grandmother, who escaped from the Warsaw Ghetto by disguising herself as a gentile. Kurzweil’s drawings convey the multiple messages about being Jewish that she received from her early years onward. Between these and her family history, she feels anxious and burdened, yet by the memoir’s end, she is able to achieve a nuanced acceptance of who she is. Elissa Altman’s compelling memoir, Treyf: My Life as an Unorthodox Outlaw, captures the contradictions

and absurdities of a Queens childhood in which being Jewish co-existed with a longing for the forbidden and a desire for acceptance in the larger culture. Altman vividly conveys her family’s split personality: The religious bat mitzvahs followed by shrimp-in-lobster sauce lunches; her parents refusing to have a Christmas tree yet plunking her down on the lap of a department store Santa; and the Sunday morning bacon-and-egg breakfasts before visiting her observant grandparents. Altman struggles to find peace and meaning and her place in the world as her parents’ marriage disintegrates and drugs and sex pervade the society around her. Ultimately, she does finds love and acceptance, but not without a sense of loss for where she came from. While she was president of student government at Hunter College in the late 1950s, Blanche Wiesen Cook met First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt. She has never forgotten that meeting and how the air felt charged with ER’s vibrancy. She conveys this energy in her definitive biography of a woman who fought for the principles of social justice even as the country and her husband were not prepared to adopt them. The third and concluding volume of the biography, Eleanor Roosevelt, Volume 3: The War Years and After, 1939-1962, is due out this fall. ER was fearless in taking on many of the issues that we still wrestle with today, including racism, economic security, immigration, and equality for women. While Cook says that FDR encouraged his wife’s independence, she shows how he silenced her when reasons of state intervened. This suppressed ER’s ability to make greater strides in two areas about which she cared deeply: Racial equality and the rescue of Jewish refugees from Hitler.  JW Magazine | jwi.org/magazine

An epidemic of uncivil discourse is taking over our national dialogue. Can we break the cycle? BY DAVID M. ROSENBERG Member of JWI's Clergy Task Force to End Domestic Abuse

resident Obama’s recent call “to temper our words and open our hearts” resonates personally as well as nationally. We must, he says, “focus on words and actions that can unite this country rather than divide it.” Today, civil discourse seems to be a rarity. Granted, during a presidential election cycle, we expect to hear public figures speak intemperately. This year, however, the degree of rudeness, incivility and intemperance is particularly noticeable. Some strive to disregard or discount what they hear: They didn’t mean it; they were quoted out of context; I’m sure they didn’t say it that way. Others cannot discount what they hear and are embarrassed by it, but insist that it is not of serious concern. However, uncivil words can make a lasting, negative impact. The old children’s rhyme has it partly wrong: While it’s true that words alone cannot break one’s bones, it’s also true that they can inspire people to wield sticks and stones. The danger of incivility is incalculable, nationally and internationally as well as in our communities, workplaces, families, friendships, associations. Watching what we say and considering carefully how we respond to what we hear are tasks that need to become as regular to us as grabbing a morning cuppa or checking for messages. Examples of how our discourse has worsened are hard to miss. On the national level, insults have become a regular feature of political speech. Presidential candidate Donald Trump has frequently characterized his opponents as “pathetic,” “a loser,” “disgraceful,” and “crazy,” and has gained popularity and public standing in the process. He has directed similar disrespect to immigrant groups entering the U.S. In one northern Virginia school, reported Bruce Leshan on WUSA 9, white elementary schoolchildren ostensibly told darker-skinned classmates, “When Trump is president, you’ll be deported.” And in Indiana, according to a statement issued by the Diocese of Gary, white students at one Catholic high school reportedly taunted the Hispanic students on the basketball team of another Catholic school with the chant, “Build that wall!” According to a report on CNN, even Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg abandoned her judicial reserve and called presidential candidate Donald Trump a “faker,” perhaps reflecting the state of discourse in the country. 64

JW Magazine | jwi.org/magazine

And this increase in uncivil discourse has crept into the workplace. Christine Porath of Georgetown University and Christine Pearson of Thunderbird School of Global Management wrote about “The Price of Incivility” in an article of the same name that appeared in the January-February 2013 issue of the Harvard Business Review. They point to their research finding that “Rudeness at work is rampant, and it’s on the rise.” Porath and Pearson found that “targets of incivility often punish their offenders and the organization,” including by taking their frustration out on customers. When rudeness or bullying continues unaddressed, creativity suffers, performance and team spirit deteriorate, and customers turn away. Whether on the national stage or in our workplaces, we seem to be experiencing, wrote Alexander Heffner in a piece on RealClearPolitics.com (January 14, 2016), a generalized “trickle-down discourse” and a “spiral of incivility.” Rudeness begets rudeness, and sometimes leads to other behaviors. This dynamic can affect our friendships, romantic relations, and families. Dorothy Espelage of the department of educational psychology at the University of Illinois and Erin Reiney of the Health Resources and Services Administration, writing on stopbullying.gov, described the connections between bullying and family violence, sexual harassment, and dating violence. How can individuals resist the temptation to join this wave of incivility? The rabbinic sages of the Pirke Avot (Ethics of the Fathers) counseled, “be careful with your words,” for illchosen words can lead to lies, exile, and death. We should avoid words that belittle and divide. When we encounter such words, we should express our opposition to them in ways that don’t contribute to further division. The sages further encouraged their students to imitate the biblical Aaron, “loving peace and pursuing peace.” We further peace when we express positive words that elicit human goodness and bring people together. When surrounded by negative discourse, it is tempting to succumb. But we need to remind ourselves that the price of incivility for society – and our own souls – is too steep.  Rabbi David M. Rosenberg is the coordinator of Jewish educational services at the Jewish Child and Family Services in Chicago, Ill.

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