Dr. Cliff Nerwen has a passion for child protection. Can you tell a child predator from someone who is simply being friendly to your child? And, more importantly, can your child tell the difference? Dr. Cliff Nerwen, a pediatrician and president of Conservative Synagogue Adath Israel of Riverdale in New York who won last year’s Shoshana S. Cardin Award for his child protection work, says the ability to discern between...
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Elianna Sokoler of Southern California’s Temple Aliyah was one of four Americans who had the chance to test their knowledge of the Tanach in Israel. After endless hours of daily studying, note taking and memorizing the most minute details, everything finally came together earlier this year for now-college freshman Elianna Sokoler of Temple Aliyah in Woodland Hills, California. Elianna represented the United States in ...
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For wherever you go, I will go; wherever you lodge, I will lodge; your people shall be my people, and your God my God.” —Ruth 1:16 Conversion to Judaism in Israel is not simple. Nevertheless, some remarkable people have chosen Judaism—chosen to link their lives with the Jewish people through the Israeli Masorti Movement’s welcoming, egalitarian, warm tradition. While the State of Israel recognizes Masorti conversio...
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With tuition at public four-year universities having increased by 213 percent since 1988 (while family income has only risen by 11 percent) and with a vast majority of students now paying for some or all of their college education, more students than ever are left wondering when and how their next healthy meal will come. Two students and one alumni who participated in past cohort groups. As a result, nearly half of...
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By Zelene Lovitt Zelene Lovitt When my mother was 9 years old, she contracted polio. That may be a benign sentence to read in 2019, but it was earth shattering at the time. Not only did polio impact her life, but it had a ripple effect on my own. Polio eventually brought me into the world of inclusion and ultimately gave me a mission to help people with physical, mental and emotional difficulties. A spinal tap g...
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Ellis Corets, now 88, is a Korean War veteran who’s spent the last eight years researching and documenting Jewish service members who were killed or missing in action (M.I.A.) during World Wars I and II, as well as those M.I.A. in the Korean and Vietnam Wars. Each of 3,560 soldiers he’s documented are buried or memorialized overseas. When Rabbi Jay Rosenbaum of Herzl-Ner Tamid Conservative Congregation in Mercer Islan...
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One woman can’t do it because she is breastfeeding her newborn. A man can’t do it because he is diabetic. And another can’t do it because he is on daily medication that must be taken with food and water. There are so many reasons why fasting—a way in which we practice self-denial—is just not feasible on Yom Kippur. Still, Jews can observe the holiday in ways that are personally meaningful. Putting your health first is a ...
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By Jared Rogers Upon arriving at the University of Pennsylvania, I was terrified of not finding authentic communities to call my own. Before college, I lived and breathed Conservative Judaism; I was a student at Schechter Long Island, a counselor at Ramah Nyack and an officer on USY’s International Executive Board. Unsurprisingly, I fell in love with the Conservative Jewish Community (CJC) at Penn. CJC provided me...
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It’s said that you can’t truly understand and empathize with someone until you have walked a mile in their shoes. While that wasn’t possible, 43 staff and teens traveling on one of the USY on Wheels Classic buses this summer got close while revisiting the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, which was the target of the worst anti-Semitic mass shooting in U.S. history last October that left 11 members dead ...
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Loved and respected by everyone around him, Benjamin Beezy seemed to have the world at his fingertips. After attending Milken Community High School, Ben graduated summa cum laude from the University of Southern California, completed law school and was working at a high-caliber law firm—all while still being involved in the Valley Beth Shalom community in Encino, California. Still, all this wasn’t enough to overcome the h...
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