April Baskin has been committed to opening doors and embracing diversity in the Jewish community throughout her career. Raised in Sacramento, CA, by a white Jewish mother and a non-Jewish African-American father, Baskin was immersed in Reform Jewish life from an early age, and relished opportunities in her synagogue, camp, and youth group to engage in Jewish learning and participate in social action. “I was that rare kid who loved Hebrew school,” she has said. As an adult, she drew on her experience as a young, multiracial Jew who had felt both inside and outside mainstream Jewish life, to consult with Jewish organizations across the country on diversity initiatives. Baskin attended Tufts University, graduating with a degree in Sociology in 2013. She served as president of the Jewish Multiracial Network from 2010 to 2013 and worked at InterfaithFamily from 2014 to 2015. In 2015, she joined the Union of Reform Judaism (URJ) as Vice President of Audacious Hospitality, a title that reflected the URJ’s commitment to welcoming groups of Jews who have traditionally been marginalized from institutional Jewish settings. This position, which she held until 2019, was a natural outgrowth of Baskin’s dedication to social justice, activism, and outreach and enabled her to shape programs and policies that she said, “incorporate the diversity that is the reality and future of Jewish life.” In that same year, Baskin founded Joyous Justice, a coaching organization dedicated to social justice and spiritual transformation that offers leadership training courses among other educational materials and releases a weekly podcast combining wellness and social justice. She was a featured speaker at the National Women’s March in 2019 and a member of the Women’s March Inc. Steering Committee, and she served as the Racial Justice Director at the Jewish Social Justice Roundtable from 2019 to 2021. As of 2023, Baskin remains director of Joyous Justice.