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By collecting the history of Jewish women in the Jewish Women’s Archive, Gail Twersky Reimer ensured that anyone with an internet connection could get a more accurate, inclusive story of the Jewish community.
Working with organizations in California and beyond, Ilana Kaufman has drawn on her personal experience as a queer Jewish woman of color to advocate for diversity and inclusivity.
Turning dining hall dollars into food for the hungry, Rachel Sumekh has empowered college students to address food insecurity in their communities and has shined a light on hunger on university campuses.
Sharon Salzberg helped bring Theravedic Buddhism, one of the most conservative Buddhist dsiciplines, to America as one of the three co-founders of the Insight Meditation Society in 1974.
A political operative who served as deputy director of issues and research for George McGovern’s 1972 presidential campaign, Sara Teitelbaum Ehrman had an inadvertent brush with history when she drove Hillary Rodham to Arkansas while urging her not to marry Bill Clinton.
During her term as the first female Speaker of the Knesset, Dalia Itzik was called upon to take on another first when she became the first female Interim President of Israel in 2007.
In 1994 Judith Seitz Rodin became the first permanent woman president of an Ivy League school when she took the helm of the University of Pennsylvania.
Veronika Wolf Cohen has shaped Israeli minds in two very different ways, by developing national music curricula and by leading innovative Israeli-Palestinian dialogue groups.
Through her genealogical program Routes to Roots, Miriam Weiner helped Jews access historical records that had survived the Soviet suppression of information throughout Eastern Europe.
Rozka Korczak-Marla was one of three leaders of the Vilna Ghetto uprising, which, astonishingly, ended with successful escapes rather than mass executions.
Rosa Grena Kliass is considered one of the most important landscape architects in Brazil for her ability to reshape areas that include established buildings and charged histories.
Shulamith Katznelson helped make Israel a home for a wider range of people as both a pioneer of Hebrew-immersion programs and an advocate for Israeli-Palestinian dialogue.
Alice Shalvi created opportunities for Israeli women and girls, offering Talmud study to Orthodox girls and spearheading legislative reforms for women’s employment.
Rabbi Barbara Penzner has been a moral force for her congregation, leading it in multiple actions to uphold human rights around the world and in the local community.
Rabbi Elaine Zecher uses her own experiences of illness and struggle to counsel congregants and craft prayers for Mishkan T’fillah and Mishkan HaNefesh, the prayer books of the Reform Movement.
As senior rabbi of Washington DC’s Sixth & I Historic Synagogue, Shira Stutman has found new ways to engage Jews at the intersection of Jewish practice and social justice.
Rabbi Haviva Ner-David chronicled her struggles to become an Orthodox woman rabbi in her celebrated book Life on the Fringes: A Feminist Journey Toward Traditional Rabbinic Ordination before finally achieving her dream in 2006.
Throughout her career, Rabbi Avis Miller has searched for new ways to educate, engage, and support unaffiliated Jews and those on the margins of the Jewish community.
After a car accident left Rabbi Lynne Landsberg struggling with a traumatic brain injury, she devoted her career to ensuring that Jews with disabilities have full access to the richness of Jewish life.