Share the love! Please add your “mazel tov" for our fellows below.

Friends, this week I’m feeling so deeply appreciative of the work that is happening by and for Jewish leaders of color, I wanted to share some highlights with you. 

Have you ever seen or heard the advice, “be the person you needed as a child”? That’s kind of what the Ko’ach Fellowship is for me. When I was a Vice President at the URJ, I deeply needed a mentor who was Jewish leader of color who had walked that “senior executive at a large establishment institution” path before. That person just didn’t exist. 

For me, and for so many Jewish leaders of color, we have already exceeded most expectations others have placed on us (thanks, racism, other -isms, and conventional “business as usual” norms…), but we’re not done. Deep down, I know--and other Global Majority Jewish leaders know--we’re just getting started. 

The fellowship, named after the Hebrew word for “strength” and “power,” is an intersectional and liberation-focused leadership training program, community, and mastermind, by and for Jews of Color. I created it to affirm deeply-accomplished JOC leaders’ capacity to achieve feats and accomplish internal/spiritual goals that often exist beyond the visionary limits of many of the institutions, communities, and leaders we regularly encounter. 

It was important to me that Ko’ach intentionally counter the institutional cultures that, often unwittingly, continue to center whiteness over the clarity of vision and expertise many JOC leaders possess.

Our phenomenal inaugural cohort kicked off Presidents’ Day weekend, 2021. The program is supported through grants from the RiseUp Initiative, which funds and nurtures work that strengthens Jewish social justice, and an anonymous donor. 

Share the love! Please add your “mazel tov" for our fellows, as a group or for an individual fellow, in the comments below!