As Rabbi David Cohen steps away, Jacobsen embraces a new beginning that she didn’t see coming  “It all started with meeting a nice Jewish boy,” said Rabbi Ora Jacobsen. “My husband!”  Jacobsen started as Congregation Sinai’s new Rabbi this month, but becoming a Jewish professional was not her original plan. She was not born into a Jewish […]

Singing “Hatikva” at the  Yom HaZikaron commemoration at the Harry & Rose Samson Family Jewish Community Center, from left to right: Eitan Ben Zeev (shin shin), Mia Ostrovsky (shin shin), Or Kashi (Jewish Agency for Israel Fellow), then seven Israeli women from the Yad Mordechai delegation – Shuli Orit- Schneider, Ziv Eldan Harrari, Sivan Chen Sardam, Shani Rieger, Ofer Hemo, Maya Derfner- Shifman and Gili Degani. Written in […]

Lauren Blumenthal teaches at Bader Hillel Academy Upon finishing her teaching certificate, Lauren Blumenthal began searching for a teaching position, with her sights set on early education in the Milwaukee area. She came across a paraprofessional position in a K-5 classroom at Bader Hillel Academy (BHA) and applied. Brad Grayvold, the assistant principal at BHA, noticed her […]

Grief and hardship, as told by a family man   Children scrambled to and fro as the sound of community filled the air at a Congregation Shalom family Shabbat, but the Seigels were in their own bubble, sitting expectantly.   “Sammy, my older one, who will turn 7 in a couple of months … [was] like, […]

One moment in the ten-year-old Repairing Together program, aimed at a better Milwaukee and a more tolerant world   MILWAUKEE – Kellen Abston, the hip-hop performer who goes by “Klassik,” told the kids that he was here today on his birthday.  He added that there was nowhere he’d rather be.  The Milwaukee showman – who infuses his work with soul, jazz, storytelling and a healthy dose of impressive falsetto – does youth engagement workshops at schools, museums, and elsewhere. This one was […]

Cantors David Barash and Perry Fine, friends who sang together in one of the Salute to Song and Spirit concerts.   Cantor David Barash has spent 25 years building a musical tradition that has become one of Congregation Emanu-El B’ne Jeshurun’s most beloved — and most successful — fundraisers.  What began as an experiment has grown into the […]