GUEST LECTURERS

Who will teach you on this course

Rabbi Sylvia Rothschild

Ordained by Leo Baeck College in 1987 Sylvia was rabbi for Bromley Synagogue for 16 years and then pioneered the first job share rabbinate with Sybil Sheridan at Wimbledon Synagogue for a further 12 years. Currently she is the Spiritual Care lead at a hospice in Kent, and has been rabbi for Lev Chadash Milano in Italy for seven years.

Rabbi Michael Hilton

Michael Hilton is Rabbi Emeritus at Kol Chai Hatch End Reform Jewish Community; Scholar in Residence at the Liberal Jewish Synagogue, London: Lehrhaus Tutor in Classical Greek, Leo Baeck College and an Honorary Research Fellow at the Centre for Jewish Studies, University of Manchester.

He is the author of three books: The Gospels and Rabbinic Judaism - A Study Guide (with Gordian Marshall OP), The Christian Effect on Jewish Life, and Bar Mitzvah - A History. His current research is about the shared history and similarities between Judaism and Islam.

Shuvi Hoffman

Shuvi Hoffman, Global Jewish Education Manager at The National Library of Israel, is a “Revivim” graduate, an honors program in Hebrew University, where she received her BA in Jewish studies and her MA in Biblical studies. Taught Tanach, Jewish philosophy and Hebrew, wrote Jewish studies curriculum and worked as a teachers’ mentor in various frameworks. She spent two years in New York teaching Hebrew and Tanach in SAR High School, as well as teaching at “Drisha” summer programs.

Rabbi Judith Rosen-Berry

Rabbi Dr. Judith Rosen-Berry received smicha from Rabbi Sheila Shulman in 2009.

She went on to become the rabbi of the Beit Klal Yisrael Community. Currently Rabbi Judith is

living in, and and teaching theology and philosophy in Oxford, UK and at the Leo Baeck

College, London.

Sophie Bigot-Goldblum

Sophie holds a MA in Jewish Studies from Hebrew University (Magna Cum Laude) and is an alumna of Paideia : the European Institute for Jewish Studies. She has spent many years learning Torah at Pardes, the Conservative Yeshiva and Mechon Hadar. She is the director of Jewish Engagement for BBYO Europe and Talmud faculty at Hillel Germany and at the Conservative Yeshiva’s summer program.

Cantor Deborah Jacobson

Cantor Jacobson grew up in New York and received her undergraduate degree at New York University and her Masters in Sacred Music and Ordination from The Jewish Theological Seminary.

She has led communities across America as well as in Australia and Asia. She has over 20 years of experience successfully teaching bar and bat mitzvah students of all ages and abilities the joy and honor of chanting Torah, Haftarah and singing prayers in public. She is also an expert in teaching music ranging from liturgical prayers and holiday songs to popular Jewish music and American standards to children, teens and adults of varying levels and experience.

Lisa Isen Baumal

Lisa Isen Baumal is the Principal of Youth Education and Family Engagement at Holy Blossom Temple in Toronto, Ontario. Prior to her current role , she has served in a variety of roles over the past 16 years, including Grade 7 teacher, B’nei Mitzvah Coordinator and Youth Engagement Director. Lisa received her MA in Religious Education from the Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion in 2021. Lisa spends part of each summer on faculty at URJ Camp George, where her child is going to be one of the oldest campers.

Suzanne Hersh

Suzanne Hersh has taught children and adults in various settings, from federal prisons to public and parochial schools. For eighteen years she taught elementary French (FSL) at Bialik Hebrew Day School. Suzanne continues to work at Holy Blossom Temple as a B’nei Mitzvah tutor and for many years was a Shabbat and holiday children’s break-out group leader.  (Fun fact: Suzanne was consecrated, confirmed and married at Holy Blossom, and her children became B’nei Mitzvah's there).  She taught at Congregation Habonim’s Jewish Heritage School where she was the principal for three years and the B’nei Mitzvah program co-ordinator for two.  She is co-artistic director of an independent theatre company, thresholdtheatre.ca

Sandra Merovic

Sandra Merovic was born in Brazil and immigrated to Israel in 1977. She and her husband then came to Canada in 1987. Sandra completed her teacher’s seminar and a BA in Education and Counselling in Brazil and received a MA in Special Education in Israel. Sandra has worked at Holy Blossom Temple in Toronto as a Hebrew and Judaic teacher, visual arts specialist and a B’nei Mitzvah tutor for over 30 years, working with children with different learning styles and needs. She also works as a Brain Therapy Trainer at Maxi Mind Learning Centre.

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Rabbi Tom Kucera

Before his rabbinical studies, Tom Kučera received his PhD in biochemistry. In the middle of his studying at the (now) Masaryk University in Brno in Czech Republic, the „velvet revolution“ opened the borders and he could continue his accademical career abroad. After two years of the Jewish studies in Jerusalem, he was accepted to the rabbinical school Abraham Geiger College in Berlin. He was ordained in 2006 during the first rabbinical ordination in Germany after the Shoah. Since then he serves in the Reform congregation Beth Shalom in Munich.

Alex Scheepens

Alex Scheepens is a doctoral candidate in the History Department at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He received his M.A. in European Studies (2016) and B.A. in International Relations and History (2014), both from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, and completed a second M.A. in History at the University of Wisconsin-Madison (2021). His current research centers on the Jewish experience in hiding during the Nazi occupation of the Netherlands. Alongside his dissertation work, his teaching and research interests range from topics in modern European Jewish history and the Holocaust to the history of antisemitism, Zionism, and the State of Israel.