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Happenings

Rabbi Faryn Borella will be installed as Or Shalom’s community rabbi Sept. 6-7. The two-day celebration will include happy hour, Shabbat services, meals, workshops, singing, Havdalah, klezmer, dancing and an installation ceremony.

On July 25, each regional office of Jewish Family and Children’s Services held a siyyum (completion ceremony) to recognize the 84 Bay Area teens who participated in JFCS’ YouthFirst Summer Internship Program. In the six-week paid internship, high school students are matched in positions with host organizations according to their areas of professional interest to gain work experience. This year, summer interns from high schools in San Francisco, the Peninsula and Marin County were placed with 53 participating businesses and nonprofit organizations.Applications for next summer open in December (jfcs.org/find-help/youth/internships).

Comings & goings

Mor Shimonie has been hired as director of family education at The Kitchen, an independent congregation in San Francisco. Shimonie most recently headed a secular yeshiva under Bina, a Jewish education and social activism nonprofit based in Israel. She also founded the Bina House in India and the Bina community in Tel Aviv-Jaffa, serving as its spiritual and educational leader. She developed a learning community department at Neve Schechter, a center for contemporary Jewish art and culture in Tel Aviv. She was a fellow at the Honey Foundation for Community Spiritual Leadership in Israel, graduated from the Mandel Institute and has a bachelor’s degree in Jewish philosophy and Bible along with a teaching diploma from Tel Aviv University. Shimonie will be ordained as a rabbi by the Shalom Hartman Institute in Jerusalem in September.

Rabbi Arthur Nemitoff joined Congregation Beth Am in Los Altos Hills as its interim senior rabbi on July 1. He will serve the Reform congregation for one year while it continues its search for a permanent senior rabbi. Rabbi Jeremy Morrison departed as senior rabbi last summer. “He’s wonderful, a terrific partner,” said board president Amy Gerstein. “We are very fortunate to have found him.” After 40 years as a pulpit rabbi, including at his childhood synagogue in Kansas City, Kansas, Nemitoff retired in 2021 to work as an interim rabbi, ready to assist during periods of synagogue transition. “My last two congregations were in transition, some distress,” he told J., referring to his recent interim positions in Washington state and Iowa. “I realized I enjoy helping congregations heal and move on to another place. I hope to be able to do that here as well. Beth Am has great bones and a great history — and a great future ahead of it.” Nemitoff heads a four-member clergy team that includes Cantor Jaime Shpall, Associate Rabbi Heath Watenmaker and Assistant Rabbi Shoshana Nambi. Like Nemitoff, Nambi began working at Beth Am on July 1. 

Rabbi Andi Berlin will serve as interim rabbi for Congregation Shomrei Torah in Santa Rosa through June 2025, following the retirement of Rabbi George Gittleman. Berlin previously served as a rabbi at Temple Sinai of Oakland. Most recently, she operated Berlin Consulting, working with corporations on conflict resolution, leadership development and organizational growth. Berlin was a member and chair of the Ethics Committee of the Central Conference of American Rabbis, president of the Pacific Area of Reform Rabbis and chair of the East Bay Council of Rabbis. 

Vivien Braly is the new board co-chair of Shalom Bayit, the Bay Area Jewish nonprofit committed to preventing domestic violence. Braly is director of PJ Library Bay Area and previously served as its family engagement officer and program coordinator.

Ruth Reinhard Fletcher is Jewish Silicon Valley’s new board chair. She succeeds Avery Kaufman Borenstein, who served as chair for the last three years. Fletcher previously served as board chair of the Addison Penzak JCC and is currently one of four vice chairs of the Jewish Community Center Association North America and chair of the Jewish Welfare Board Jewish Chaplains Council Committee. 

Laurie Beijen is the new board chair of 18Doors, an organization that works to empower people in interfaith relationships to engage in Jewish life. Beijen has served on its board for five years, chaired its program committee for two years and served on the Bay Area leadership council of 18Doors.

Honors

Shalom Bayit, the Bay Area Jewish nonprofit committed to preventing domestic violence, received a two-year grant from SRE Network to continue its We Commit project to address sexual harassment in congregations and Jewish organizations, make women’s safety a priority in Jewish communal life and help Jewish institutions align their actions with their values to create respectful workplaces. Shalom Bayit is one of 12 Jewish nonprofits across the nation to receive a grant from SRE Network.

Kat Morgan of Urban Adamah, the Berkeley-based Jewish farm, is part of the inaugural group of “talent leaders” selected for Leading Edge’s Culture Accelerator. The accelerator is a development program for professionals leading the “people work” at their organizations. Over seven months, participants will engage in five virtual learning sessions and an intensive in-person retreat and create a talent initiative plan.

Congregation Shir Hadash in Los Gatos was one of 16 grant recipients of the Adamah Climate Action Fund. The organizations are members of the Jewish Climate Leadership Coalition, a group of more than 350 Jewish organizations that take concrete actions to reduce emissions and be environmentally conscious. 

There were a number of awards given by the Jewish Film Institute at the 44th San Francisco Jewish Film Festival, which concluded Aug. 4. The audience award for best narrative feature went to “Running on Sand,” Adar Shafran’s Israeli drama about a young Eritrean refugee at risk of deportation from Israel. The audience award for best documentary feature went to “Porcelain War,” Slava Leontyev and Brendan Bellomo’s film profiling the practices of Ukrainian artists as they find and create beauty amid the destruction of war. The best documentary short award went to “Center of Life,” Jacob Arenber’s film following one Palestinian family’s efforts to obtain Israeli citizenship. The award for best narrative short went to “Maurice’s Bar,” Tom Prezman and Tzor Edery’s animated short about a gay bar’s tragic fate under the Nazi occupation of France. The SFJFF44 San Francisco Bay Area Film Critics Circle Award went to “The Vanishing Soldier,” Dani Rosenberg’s thriller about a young Israeli soldier who deserts his unit and returns to Tel Aviv, only to learn the IDF believes he has been kidnapped. The SFJFF44 Freedom of Expression Award went to documentarian Julie Cohen.

In other Jewish Film Institute news, the recipients of its 2024 JFI Completion Grants have been announced, with $80,000 in funding distributed to six independent documentary film projects exploring issues of race, gender, art, conflict and peace-building. The grants provide resources for filmmakers completing the final stages of their films. Grantees include Netalie Braun’s “Oxygen,” Nicole Teeny’s “Bulletproof Stockings,” Amber Fares’ “Coexistence, My Ass!” Billy Shebar’s “Monk in Pieces,” Ondi Timoner’s “All God’s Children” and Marlene D. McCurtis’ “Wednesdays In Mississippi.”

Opportunities

Applications for Oshman Family JCC’s PREP Fellowship are open. PREP, short for Pride, Renewal, Education and Purpose, is a seven-month life-skills program for current high school students to learn how to successfully transition to college, the workforce or a gap year. Participants will gather for 10 workshops at OFJCC and one spring retreat. Apply by Nov. 18.

Oshman Family JCC is accepting applications to its yearlong Kol Isha Women’s Leadership Program. The intensive program brings together local women to build community, participate in Jewish learning and create local social justice projects. It includes a five-day service-learning trip to Scottsdale, Arizona. Applications close Aug. 31.

Applications for the 2025 JFI Filmmakers in Residence Program open Sept. 6. The yearlong artist residency provides creative, marketing and production support for emerging and established filmmakers whose work explores and expands thoughtful consideration of Jewish history, life, culture and identity.

Applications are open for the Bronfman Fellowship, a yearlong program of study and discussion about pluralism, social responsibility and Jewish texts, beginning with a summer in Israel. Applicants must be in 11th grade, identify as Jewish and live in the U.S. or Canada. Prior Jewish education is not required. Apply by Dec. 2.