Jane Susswein, Board President, has been involved with the Reconstructionist movement since 1978, when she and her husband joined Bnai Keshet in Montclair, New Jersey. She served on the regional and then national board of the Jewish Reconstructionist Federation (formerly known as FRCH- Federation of Reconstructionist Congregations and Havurot) and served as President for four years. She continues to be involved at Bnai Keshet.
Jane is an active member of her community in Montclair. She has served on the Civil Rights Commission and the Board of Education. In 1997, she helped found the Montclair Community Pre-K, a unique public-private partnership whose mission is to allow any child to have an affordable high-quality preschool education. She continues to serve on its board.
Jane grew up in Montclair, graduated from Wellesley College in 1968 with a degree in Philosophy, and from the Harvard Graduate School of Education with an MAT in 1970. She has taught elementary school and science. Jane and her husband, Harvey, have two grown daughters and four grandchildren.
Dr. Eric Caplan, Vice President and Academic Advisor of the Kaplan Center, is an associate professor of contemporary Judaism and Jewish education at McGill University. He is currently assembling an anthology of Jewish social activist thought in North America, 1860-2021 (Jewish Publication Society) and preparing for publication the final volume of excerpts from the diaries of Mordecai Kaplan, 1951-1978 (Wayne State University Press). Eric’s book, From Ideology to Liturgy: Reconstructionist Worship and American Liberal Judaism (Hebrew Union College Press, 2002), was reissued with an extensive new preface in 2022. He is a co-founder of the Kaplan Center.
Dr. Mel Scult, Vice President and Academic Advisor of the Kaplan Center and Professor Emeritus at Brooklyn College, is the author, most recently, of The Radical American Judaism of Mordecai M. Kaplan. He also authored Judaism Faces the Twentieth-Century: A Biography of Mordecai M. Kaplan. That biography has been published in Hebrew by Yediot Ahronot. He is the editor of a selection from the twenty-seven-volume Kaplan diary entitled, Communings of the Spirit. In addition, he has published essays on Solomon Schechter and Henrietta Szold.
Mel’s essay “Schechter’s Seminary“ is included in Tradition Renewed A History of the Jewish Theological Seminary. Along with Rabbi Emanuel S. Goldsmith, Mel edited Dynamic Judaism-The Essential Writings of Mordecai Kaplan, a Kaplan reader that has also appeared in Hebrew. In addition, Mel, together with Rabbi Goldsmith and Dr. Robert Seltzer, edited a volume of essays on the thought of Mordecai Kaplan, titled The American Judaism of Mordecai M. Kaplan.
He is a member of West End Synagogue, a Reconstructionist congregation, and lives in New York City with his wife, Barbara Gish Scult. He earned bachelor’s degrees from the Jewish Theological Seminary of America and New York University, a master’s degree from Harvard University, and a doctorate in Judaic Studies from Brandeis University.
In addition to teaching at the City University of New York, he has also taught at Vassar College, Brandeis University, The Jewish Theological Seminary and The New School. He has lectured widely at universities and Jewish institutions including Stanford University, McGill University, Brandeis University, Georgetown University, Drake University, the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College, the Hebrew Union College–Jewish Institute of Religion (Cincinnati and Jerusalem), The Jewish Theological Seminary, the Spertus Institute in Chicago and The Van Leer Jerusalem Institute. He is a co-founder of the Kaplan Center.
Rabbi Dr. Jeffrey Schein, the Kaplan Center’s Senior Consultant for Jewish Education, is also currently director of “Text Me: Judaism and Technology,” a joint project of the Jewish Education Center of Cleveland and The Covenant Foundation. He was previously director of the Adolescent Initiative and Special Projects for the Jewish Education Center of Cleveland. For twenty years prior to that, he was a professor and director of the Education Department at the Laura and Alvin Siegal College of Judaic Studies in Cleveland. He also served as the senior consultant to the “Lekhu Lakhem” project of the Mandel Jewish Center, a major initiative to change the Jewish character of eighteen JCC camps across North America through the professional development of their directors. For seventeen years he served as the education director and then senior consultant for Jewish education to the Jewish Reconstructionist Federation, the congregational organization of the Reconstructionist movement. He also served on the faculty of the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College for nine years.
Dr. Schein is a graduate of the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College (1977) and of the doctoral program in curriculum studies of Temple University (1980). He is the author (or co-author) of Creative Jewish Education (Rossel books), Targilon: a Guide for Charting the Course of Jewish Family Education (JESNA and JRF), Windows on the Jewish Soul (JRF), Growing Together: Resources, Programs and Experiences for Jewish Family Education (ARE/Behrman House), and, most recently, Kol Ha-No’ar: The Voice of Children (a prayer book for young children and their families; JRF), as well as numerous journal articles about Jewish, other religious and general education. Most recently, he is the author of Text Me: Ancient Jewish Wisdom Meets Contemporary Technology and the forthcoming volume with Rabbi Hayim Herring L’Dor Va-Dor in a Digital Age.
With his wife Deborah Schein, an early childhood professor, he has developed a seminar series titled “The 100 Languages of Children Meet the 70 Faces of Torah” designed to create frameworks for learning across the Jewish life cycle. Together, Jeffrey and Deborah presented the seminar as guest scholars for Leo Baeck College and the Jewish community of Great Britain in 2004.
Dr. Schein’s leadership positions have included serving as national program chair for the Coalition for Alternatives in Jewish Education (CAJE), as President of the Association of Institutions of Higher Learning for Jewish Education and as a member of the board of directors of the Jewish Education Service of North America (JESNA).
Dr. Schein was the first non-pulpit rabbi to receive the Ira Eisenstein Award for distinguished community service from he Reconstructionist Rabbinical Association in 2001. In 1992, he was the founding rabbi of Kol HaLev, Cleveland’s Reconstructionist Jewish Community.
Jeffrey and Deborah’s children are Benjamin, Jonah and Hana. Their grandchildren are Ilan, Tali, Aryeh and Caleb.
Caitlin Hayes is a 2021 graduate of the University of New Brunswick’s Bachelor of Arts in Psychology program. She works as a research assistant and data manager on studies related to burnout in health care professionals during the pandemic. She is currently working on a manuscript examining the lived experience of Nova Scotian health care professionals during the early phases of the pandemic, and occupational factors which affected their burnout.
Caitlin is a congregant and board member of the Society for the Advancement for Judaism. Her Jewish interests include: Kaplanian thought, Digital Judaism, Baltic Jewish Culture since the 19th century, contemporary Jewish movements, and Jewish pedagogy across time. Her work on the board focuses on using Digital Jewish spaces to allow rural, low-income, and disabled Jews to create their own communities, and reclaim/reconstruct their practice.
Elizabeth Caplun grew up in France and Belgium. She holds a BS in Journalism and a MS in Environmental Sciences from Brussels Free University. Her career in the US took place in academic environments, with the last 20 years in executive positions at Stanford University. While in the Bay Area, she became acquainted with reconstructionist Judaism and joined Keddem Congregation in Palo Alto. She retired to Bishop, a rural community in Eastern California, where she spends her time practicing and teaching Mussar, writing poetry and exploring her gorgeous surroundings.
Rabbi Michael Margaretten Cohen is a faculty member of the Arava Institute for Environmental Studies and Bennington College. He teaches courses on conflict resolution, the Bible, and the environment. Rabbi Cohen has been a Policy Advisor to the Office of the Special Envoy for Middle East Peace, U.S. Department of State and a Speechwriter Adviser to the Office of the White House Speechwriters. He was recently named to the Advisory Board of the Partnership Peace of USAID established by Congress. Cohen, the rabbi emeritus of the Israel Congregation in Manchester Center, Vermont is the author of numerous articles that have appeared in the Middle East and the United States. He has a commentary of the Torah reading of the week in the Jerusalem Post as well as a regular column in the Jerusalem Post called Letter from America. He is the author of “Einstein’s Rabbi: A Tale of Science and the Soul.” Cohen co-founded of the Green Zionist Alliance. Cohen serves on the Board of Trustees of the Burr & Burton Academy, the Mount Equinox Preservation Trust, the Green Sabbath Project, KaTO Architecture, Shomrei Breishit: Rabbis and Cantors for the Earth, and the Jerusalem Peacebuilders. He is a recipient of the Eliav Sartawi Award for Middle East Journalism from the Search for Common Ground.
Rabbi Jeffrey Eisenstat is the Founding Director of the Reconstructionist Camp JRF and Youth Program, Noar Hadash. In over 46 years as a rabbi, he has served congregations in Plantation, FL, Philadelphia and State College, PA, directed Hillel at Penn State and has also run summer camps, youth programs, family retreats and family trips to Israel. He received his Masters in Education from Temple University and is a 1976 graduate of the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College.
At RRC, Jeff has taught courses for Rabbi as Educator, Merging Formal and Informal Jewish Learning and Transformative Text Experiences. He has served as a faculty member of the JCCA and as a mentor for the Lekhu Lakhem camp director program.
Among his writings are studies in creating family davening experiences, teaching the Civilization Approach and The Values of Spiritual Peoplehood. He has also made some musical recordings.
Jeff is a recipient of the Ira Eisenstein Lifetime Achievement Award from the Reconstructionist Rabbinical Association and from the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College Jeff has been honored with RRC’s highest award of the Keter Shem Tov. He is married to Rabbi Sarah Messinger where together they co-created Congregation Shireinu in Bryn Mawr, PA., where they used their experiential skills in creative prayer and programs.
Dawn Rosen has a Bachelor of Business Administration degree and Chartered Professional Accountant (CPA Ontario) designation. Dawn’s professional training as a management accountant has her in the position of VP Finance of the organization she’s been employed by for the past 30+ years. Dawn was exposed to Reconstructionist Judaism and Kaplan from a very young age. Dawn has been a member of Congregation Darchei Noam (Reconstructionist synagogue in Toronto) since 1993 and served on the Board in various capacities over the years: Ritual Chair, Co-President, Treasurer and Member-at-Large and continues to serve in several lay leadership roles.
Rabbi Dennis Sasso is Senior Rabbi Emeritus of Congregation Beth-El Zedeck (since July, 2023), where he had served as Senior Rabbi since 1977, when he and Rabbi Sandy Eisenberg Sasso became spiritual leaders of the congregation. He was born and raised in Panama, a descendant of Sephardic Jews that settled in the Caribbean (Curaçao and St. Thomas) in the 17th–18th centuries.
Rabbi Sasso earned his Bachelor of Arts degree with honors in Near Eastern and Judaic Studies at Brandeis University. He holds a Master of Arts in Religion from Temple University, Philadelphia, and was ordained by the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College in Philadelphia in 1974. He also studied at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and did doctoral studies at Temple University and at Christian Theological Seminary in Indianapolis, Indiana, where he obtained the Doctor of Ministry degree, and has served as Affiliate Professor of Jewish Studies for over three decades. Rabbi Sasso is the recipient of Doctor of Divinity degrees, Honoris Causa, from the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College (Philadelphia, PA), the Jewish Theological Seminary (New York, NY), and Christian Theological Seminary (Indianapolis, IN).
Rabbi Sasso is a sought-out speaker and a prolific author of popular and learned articles and essays for various newspapers, journals, and academic publications. He has served on numerous interfaith, civic and community boards and agencies. He is Past President of the Indianapolis Board of Rabbis and of the Reconstructionist Rabbinical Association. A Past-President of the Indiana Interreligious Commission on Human Equality, he was Co-Chairman of the Race Relations Leadership Network. Rabbi Sasso was Co-Chairman of the Citizens Complaint Working Group, a blue-ribbon committee appointed by Mayor Goldsmith to review and upgrade the Ordinance that regulates the Civilian Police Review Process. He has served on the Mayor’s Community Crime Prevention Task Force, on the Board of Directors of the Hispanic Center, and on the Board of the Jewish Federation of Greater Indianapolis. Rabbi Sasso served on the Advisory Board of the Lake Family Institute for Faith and Giving of the IUPUI School of Philanthropy (the first of its kind in the country), the Indianapolis Immigrant Welcome Center, the United Way of Central Indiana, the Greater Indianapolis Progress Committee, the Public Safety Clergy Committee, and the Center for Interfaith Cooperation. He has been a member of the BrebeufJesuit Preparatory School Board of Advisors and of the Mission and Education Committees.
Rabbi Sasso is the recipient of multiple honors and recognitions, including the Ira Eisenstein Award for Leadership and Service in the Rabbinate; Faith and Freedom Award of the Indiana Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice; and the Community Service Award of the NAACP. He and his wife, Rabbi Sandy Eisenberg Sasso, were “Interfaith Ambassadors of the Year” for the Center for Interfaith Cooperation, and were designated as “Hoosier Jewish Legends” by the Indiana Jewish Historical Society. In 2022 they were named “Indiana Living Legends” by the Indiana Historical Society and were listed by the Indianapolis Business Journal among the most influential leaders in Indiana. The Rabbis Sasso are the first practicing rabbinical couple in world Jewish history. They are the parents of Dr. David Sasso (Dr. Naomi Libby) and Dr. Debora (Dr. Bradley) Herold. They are the proud grandparents of Darwin, Ari, Raven, and Levi.
Rabbi Gail Shuster-Bouskila has earned two degrees in education. She finished her rabbinic studies requirements at Hebrew University and was ordained at Reconstructionist Rabbinical College in Philadelphia in 1979. She is the first woman rabbi in Israel.
Since making Aliyah in 1978, she has been a free-lance rabbi. She has counseled many people on life cycle events, including women’s issues, marriage and Bar/Bat Mitzvah and has lectured around Israel about modern Midrash, liberal Judaism, women’s issues and the philosophy of Rabbi Mordecai Kaplan. Her midrashim on the weekly Torah portions are on her website https://midrash-harabah.org/.
She retired from the Academic English department of the Open University of Israel in 2017, but still tutors students with Learning Disabilities to complete their English Language requirement.
Mr. Jacob (Jack) Wolofsky graduated from McGill University with a B.Eng. in l953 and received an M.S. Eng. in 1954 from the University of Illinois. After graduation he worked for, and as, a consulting engineer. Jack’s family has long been active in the Montreal Jewish community. When, in l963, Jack found Rabbi Lavy Becker, and the synagogue that he had recently founded in Montreal (now called Congregation Dorshei Emet), he felt that this was home. Jack has served as the president of Congregation Dorshei Emet and as a member of the Board of Governors of the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College. He is a co-founder of The Mordecai Kaplan Center for Jewish Peoplehood.