Rabbi Ruth Abusch-Magder Named Director of the Joint Commission on Sustaining Rabbinic Education

Rabbi Ruth Abusch-Magder (HUC-JIR/NY 2006) has been named Director of the Joint Commission on Sustaining Rabbinic Education. Established in 1994, the Joint Commission creates programs for continuing study for CCAR members and for rabbinic and other alumni of HUC-JIR, in partnership with the College-Institute's Department of eLearning.

Her predecessor, Ellen Nemhauser, will become the Synagogue Educator at Temple Emanu-El in Atlanta, Georgia.

Abusch-Magder received her PhD from Yale University and has also studied at Brandeis University, Barnard College, and Hebrew University-Jerusalem. She spent the past year as a Mandel fellow in Jerusalem, where her final project was Homemade Judaism: Enriching Connections and Knowledge Through Experiential Learning.

Abusch-Magder is moving to Evanston, Illinois with her husband David, the principal of the Solomon Schecter of Skokie, and children, Oren and Aliza.


Founded in 1875, Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion is the nation's oldest institution of higher Jewish education and the academic, spiritual, and professional leadership development center of Reform Judaism. HUC-JIR educates men and women for service to American and world Jewry as rabbis, cantors, educators, and communal service professionals, and offers graduate and post-graduate programs to scholars of all faiths. With centers of learning in Cincinnati, Jerusalem, Los Angeles, and New York, HUC-JIR's scholarly resources comprise renowned library and museum collections, the American Jewish Archives, biblical archaeology excavations, research institutes and centers, and academic publications. HUC-JIR invites the community to an array of cultural and educational programs which illuminate Jewish history, identity, and contemporary creativity and which foster interfaith and multiethnic understanding.
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