It was a remarkable year at the Hartman Institute.
It was a remarkable year at the Hartman Institute.
It was a remarkable year at the Hartman Institute.
It was a remarkable year at the Hartman Institute.
Board of Directors
This year we welcomed three new members to the Board of Directors:
Diana Anderson
Denver, CO
Diana Anderson has been active in the Jewish world since 2005. She serves as the Chair of the Board of Directors of JEWISHcolorado. Her Kesher Foundation, whose mission is to build the connection (kesher in Hebrew) between her local Colorado community and Israel, is the lead funder of both the Community Shaliach and Shinshinim programs in Denver. Diana serves as treasurer of the United Israel Appeal, Inc. and is on the National Council of AIPAC as well as AIPAC’s local Executive committee. She also serves on the Board of ADL. Diana had served as a Committee Member of The Jewish Agency for Israel since 2014 and in June 2015 she was elected as a Member of the Board. Outside of the Jewish community, Diana serves on Denver Academy’s School Board. Diana has a BA in Economics from Claremont Mckenna College and studied at Boston College in Israel for an MS in Business. Originally from Denver, Diana lived, worked, and raised four children in Israel from 1981-2005.
Carolyn Kolers
Toronto, ON
Carolyn Kolers was a partner at Goodman and Carr LLP, where she practiced corporate commercial law for 11 years before joining Cara Operations Limited (now Recipe Unlimited) as in-house counsel. In 2009, she left Cara to devote her time to a variety of volunteer initiatives in the Jewish community. Carolyn served on numerous committees at Beth Tzedec Congregation before being appointed to the Board of Governors, becoming Chair of the Board and then President of the Congregation. As Immediate Past President, she co-chaired the synagogue’s Strategic Planning initiative. Following her completion of UJA Federation’s Joshua Institute for Jewish communal leaders, where she was first introduced to the Shalom Hartman Institute, Carolyn has served on several committees at UJA Federation of Greater Toronto, including the Israel Engagement Strategy Committee, Israel Engagement Mission Chair (2017 and 2019), and the Jewish Identity Committee. She also served as Planning and Strategy Chair for the 2015 Biennial Convention of United Synagogue for Conservative Judaism (USCJ). She is a graduate of the University of Toronto Faculty of Law and holds a Bachelor of Commerce degree from U of T. Carolyn and her husband Eliot Kolers have two sons.
Michelle Shulman
Toronto, ON
Michelle Shulman spent most of her career assisting Israeli startup companies to expand into international markets. She is a graduate of York University and received her MBA from the Schulich School of Business. Michelle serves as the Co-Chair of the Board and chairs the fundraising efforts for The Toronto Heschel School. She also serves as Vice-Chair of the Lola Stein Institute, a think-tank engaged in advancing innovative Jewish education. Michelle is deeply involved in the publication of THINK, a journal designed to spark conversation about education, ethics and our children.
Sidney Friedman, MD
SHI North America Board of Directors; Los Angeles, CA
Intellectual Excitement and Accessibility: I had the great fortune to audit a class in Modern Jewish Thought taught by Rabbi David Hartman z"l when he was a visiting professor at UCLA. He made it exciting to think and wonder about the nature of Jewish observance, the meaning of commandedness, and the relationship between Israel and the Jewish polity. He was very "hamish" and easy to connect with personally. I imagined that the Shalom Hartman Institute would be equally exciting intellectually as well as nurturing and accessible. I discovered an organization filled with people who cared about Jews and Judaism, who were serious in their intention to live Jewish lives and comfortable with diverse expressions of that intention. Equally important was the experience of a warm and nurturing community that I think is a hallmark of the Hartman Institute.
Sustaining and Enriching Jewish Life: The dedication to the study and interpretation of Jewish texts as a way to enrich the present lives of Jews in America is a profound methodology well utilized by SHI North America. All Jews have access to and a relationship with the same sources. By studying them together, the participants reinforce their sense of common purpose and interdependence as well as sustaining and enriching their Jewishness. SHI North America is also dedicated to "teaching the teachers," providing them with source materials and insight as to how to interpret and reinterpret these texts within the framework of their individual Jewish communities.
Impactful Programs: SHI’s Be’eri program has helped to nurture and foster the resurgence of lived Judaism in Israel. I was deeply moved when an 11th grade student whose family had never observed a single Jewish practice prior to the implementation of the program in her school spoke about how her life, and her family's life, were enriched by the program.
I hope the new "Foundations for a Thoughtful Judaism" program will make a similar impact in North America. This initiative exposes Jews who are in the early stages of creating their family to the ideas that have shaped Judaism. We further aim to demonstrate how these ideas have been translated into Jewish practice and the creation of a Jewish community. We hope that by gaining an understanding of these ideas and practices through the lens of a multivocal Jewish experience, participants will want to actively incorporate them into their lives and the life of their family.
Advocating for Diversity and Acceptance: The Hartman Institute is devoted to helping Jews create and maintain a rich and diverse Jewish life and identity. Without SHI, there would be no focused and insistent Jewish voice advocating for diversity and acceptance within the whole of Jewish life. There would be no voice speaking of the necessity of maintaining Israel as a democratic state which is home for all of the Jewish people. To be Jewish in the modern world involves, for many Jews, a conscious decision to lead a Jewish life. The programs of the Hartman Institute are uniquely qualified to help that person find a way to maintain, support, and make meaningful the decision to be Jewish.
Board of Directors
Shalom Hartman Institute
Shalom Hartman Institute of North America
Canadian Friends of Shalom Hartman Institute
Robert P. Kogod, Chair, Shalom Hartman Institute
Angelica Berrie, Chair, SHI NA
Elizabeth Wolfe, Chair, Canadian Friends of Shalom Hartman Institute
Donald Meltzer, Chair, SHI NA Board of Directors Executive Committee
Alvin Cramer Segal, O.C., Treasurer, Canadian Friends of Shalom Hartman Institute
Matt Berler, Chair, SHI NA Investment Committee
Alayne Sulkin, Chair, SHI NA Development Committee
Eric Zahler, Chair, SHI NA Finance and Audit Committees
Joseph M. Steiner, Secretary, Canadian Friends of Shalom Hartman Institute
Diana Anderson
Ilan Baram
Jacquie Bayley
Paul S. Berger
Yaacov Brandt
Stacy S. Dick
Raymond Fink
Alan A. Fischer
Laraine Fischer
Joel L. Fleishman
Anita Friedman
Sidney G. Friedman
Donald Friend
Charles H. Goodman
Nimrod Goor
Dafna Gruber
Ethan Horwitz
Peter A. Joseph
Igal Jusidman
Sylvia Kaufman
Amy B. Klein
Stuart Kogod
Carolyn Kolers
Gordon Lafer
Michael Lewittes
Bernard Plum
Stefanie Raker
Wayne Robbins
Nathalie Rubens
Dan Rubin
Debbie Saidoff
Naty Saidoff
David Schnell
Ronald A. Sedley
Barbara Segal
Joel Segal
Michelle Shulman
Wendy Singer
Pam Medjuk Stein
Alayne W. Sulkin
Robert M. Sulkin
Roselyne C. Swig
Joel D. Tauber
Shelley Tauber
Philip Wachs
Douglas Wilansky
Zvi Yochman
Karen Gantz Zahler
Gerald Zoldan
Marshall S. Zolla