Educational Leadership Program

Adam M. Kleinbaum is a professor in the Strategy and Management area at the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth.  He teaches leadership and organizational behavior, social networks, and leads learning expeditions to Israel, focusing on technology and entrepreneurship, and to Alabama, focusing on leadership and systemic racism. He also consults to organizations about issues of leadership and organizations, culture, and collaboration.  His research has been published in leading journals from Nature Communications to the Harvard Business Review and has been covered by media outlets ranging from the New York Times and Wall Street Journal to Teen Vogue and Cosmo. He enjoys riding his vintage 3-speed bicycle.

Arielle Levites is the Managing Director of the Collaborative for Applied Studies in Jewish Education (CASJE) and a Research Assistant Professor at George Washington University. Dr. Levites’ research focuses on contemporary American Jewish education. Her work has been recognized with awards from the Woodrow Wilson Foundation, the Society for the Scientific Study of Religion, and the Network for Research in Jewish Education. She is working on a book based on an ethnographic study of contemporary American Jewish spiritual practitioners. She recently served on the advisory committee for the Pew Research Center’s 2021 study of American Jewry.

Professionally a Jewish educator, Peter founded The Abraham Joshua Heschel School in New York City in 1983. He began his career with the creation of the Park Avenue Synagogue High School in 1967 and most recently Founded and serves as President of The KIVUNIM Institute. In the summers of 1965 and 1966 he served as a civil rights worker for Dr. Martin Luther King’s Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) in Orangeburg, SC. He played several historic roles at MLK’s funeral including accompanying Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel throughout the funeral procession and finding the mules for the funeral cortege. In 2012 he was selected to receive the Covenant Award, the highest recognition in the field of Jewish education. He was a civilian volunteer during the Six Days War. Peter served as Hazzan for the first High Holiday Youth Services in the Soviet Union in 1997-99. Peter holds a BA from Queens College (where he studied and developed a close personal relationship with the noted Jewish historian Professor Cecil Roth during the final years of Roth’s life), an MA in Religious Education from New York University and a Certificate in Psychotherapy and Counseling from the Alfred Adler Institute in New York City. He is an ABD (all but dissertation) at NYU with a thesis linking the seminal work of Erik Erikson in Identity formation to his Jewish educational philosophy and approach. He is married to Susie Kessler, Director emeritus of the Makom Mindfulness Center at the JCC in Manhattan. They have three children: sons Rabbi Jonah Geffen married to Julia Mannes and Rabbi Daniel Geffen, married to LuAnne and daughter Nessa Geffen, Director of the new Camp Ramah of the Eastern Great Lakes and married to Micah Bookman. They have 5 grandchildren, Bina, Shula, Eva, Gabriel and Emet. Peter was born, raised in and has lived in New York City throughout his lifetime.

Kathy Simon holds a B.A. in English and Hebrew Literature from Harvard University and a Ph.D. in Curriculum and Teacher Education from Stanford University. A former high school English and drama teacher, Kathy co-directed the Coalition of Essential Schools, a national school-reform organization. Kathy is the author and co-author of several books on curriculum, teaching, and school reform, including Moral Questions in the Classroom, Teaching as Inquiry, and Choosing Small. Kathy has served on the faculty of the Mandel Teacher Educator Institute since 2006. She also is a certified trainer with the Center for Nonviolent Communication, and leads communication courses and workshops for couples, parents, teachers, and non-profit organizations.

Michal Fox Smart is Chief Program Officer of the Institute for Jewish Spirituality (IJS), guiding its faculty and programs. Michal has crafted ground-breaking programs in personal and spiritual development for over 30 years. She previously served as Director of Ayeka North America and Associate Principal (Judaics) of Bi-Cultural Hebrew Academy. A pioneer in Jewish outdoor and environmental education, Michal was Executive Director of the Isabella Freedman retreat center and a co-founder of the Teva Learning Center. Michal is a graduate of Princeton and Cornell, a Fulbright Scholar, and a Wexner Graduate Fellow. Her publications include Spirit in Nature and Kaddish: Women’s Voices. An avid biker, yogini and poet, Michal lives in CT and is the proud Ema of five emerging adults, each deliciously different as people and as Jews.