Meet our Executive Director,
Ilana Kaufman
Ilana’s work sits at the center of Jewish Community, Racial Equity, and Justice is anchored by the voices and experience of Jews of Color and is focused on grantmaking, research and field building, and community education.
As a guest on NPR’s All Things Considered and Code Switch, with pieces featured in eJewish Philanthropy and The Foundation Review, and an Eli Talk titled Who Counts, Race and the Jewish Future with 16,000 views, Ilana is passionate about all things at the intersection of Jewish Community/Racial Justice/Jews of Color/Education/Philanthropy.
Prior to joining the Jews of Color Initiative Ilana was the Public Affairs and Civic Engagement Director, East Bay for the San Francisco, Bay Area Jewish Community Relations Council.
Ilana, a Senior Schusterman Fellow who is always searching Jewish Text for discussion of equity and justice received her B.A. in Sociology from California State University-Humboldt and her M.A. in Educational Pedagogy from Mills College.
Meet our Director of Programs & Operations, Angel Alvarez-Mapp
Angel is the Director of Programs and Operations of the Jews of Color Initiative. Prior to joining the Jews of Color Initiative Angel was CEO of Hello Mazel, a quarterly subscription box of unique, hand-picked Jew-ish stuff. Angel is a seasoned nonprofit professional with extensive experience in the development of comprehensive strategic plans, capital campaigns, and communication/marketing plans. He has provided strong leadership and strategic direction to organizations for more than a decade.
Angel studied Business Administration at St. Mary’s College of California, and Graphic Design at the Art Institute of California, San Francisco.
Meet our Program Officer, Gabi Kuhn
Gabi is the Program Officer of the Jews of Color Initiative. She has extensive experience working in the Bay Area Jewish community, with a focus on advocacy, philanthropy, and multicultural community building. Gabi’s work is grounded in her intersectional identity, which inspires her commitment to social and racial justice issues around the world.
Gabi received her B.A. in Global Studies from The New School in NYC, and most recently received her M.A. in Human Rights and Transitional Justice from the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. In 2020, she was a Jeremiah Fellow with Bend the Arc: Jewish Action, focusing on immigrant justice and voting rights.
Meet our Communications Associate, Emma Gonzalez-Lesser
Emma is the Communications Associate of the Jews of Color Initiative. Emma is dedicated to work that centers racial justice, Jewish peoplehood, and identity. She is a scholar-activist completing a Ph.D. in Sociology, and her research examines the identities and experiences of Jews of Color, Jews by Choice, Jewish women, LGBTQ+ Jews—and all their intersections. Emma has spent the last several years as an instructor in undergraduate classrooms teaching on justice and inequality, and serving as the Managing Editor of an academic journal.
Emma received her M.A. in Sociology from the University of Connecticut, where she is also completing her Ph.D., and her B.A. in Women’s and Gender Studies from Simmons University.
Meet our Programs Coordinator, Riki Robinson
Riki is the Programs Coordinator of the Jews of Color Initiative. Prior to joining, she was a Food Justice Fellow with Repair the World in Brooklyn where she learned about urban farming, food pantries, and SNAP benefits along with a Jewish lens to community engagement. She also has a background working in Asian American Pacific Islander organizations as well as immigration justice groups.
Riki is rooted in the theory and praxis of Ethnic Studies that research should be generated by and for community relevance. She received her B.A. in Asian American Studies and Sociology from Pitzer College.
Meet our Communications Intern, Tova Ricardo
Tova is a Bay Area native and a senior at Columbia University in New York City, studying English and Sociology. She served as the Oakland Youth Poet Laureate in 2015 and is a recipient of the American Jewish Press Association’s Simon Rockower Award for Excellence in Personal Essay. Ricardo was a member of Columbia/Barnard’s Poetry Slam Team, which placed 2nd in the national collegiate poetry slam competition, CUPSI. Ricardo has written for J. the Jewish News of Northern California and myJewishLearning, and has been featured in the San Francisco Chronicle, the J., and KQED.
Meet our Advisory Board
The Advisory Board supports the mission and work of the Jews of Color Initiative with their strategic thinking, professional networks, and ingenuity. Working alongside staff, the Advisory Board is responsible for upholding our mission and providing invaluable project oversight.
Stefanie Rhodes, Chair
Stefanie is the CEO of Slingshot in New York. She has spent the last 17 years working in Jewish philanthropy. Before joining Slingshot, Stefanie spent 9 years working at the Jewish Funders Network, where she ran the Younger Funders programming and was the founding Director of the Foundation Professionals program. Prior to joining the Jewish professional world she worked in ad agencies and tech start-ups in the Bay Area.
Stefanie holds a B.A. in Journalism and a Certificate in Jewish Studies from Indiana University, and a Certificate in Jewish Philanthropy from Yeshiva University. She is a Senior Schusterman Fellow and was a member of the inaugural CEO Onboarding cohort. Stefanie is married to Hue, and together they have two children.
Janu Mendel
Janu was born and raised in Kingston, Jamaica where he had his bar mitzvah in a sand-floored synagogue and developed his life-long love of reggae music. He completed his B.Sc. in Political Science in 2005 at the University of the West Indies. He immigrated to the United States in 2006 and worked in corporate business for seven years. Seeking something more meaningful, he found his home in Miami’s Jewish community and realized that this was where he belonged professionally. He was recruited as an Outreach Fellow for Temple Beth Am in 2013 and managed their young-adult engagement efforts for five years. Concurrently, he spent three years on staff as the Director of Engagement at the University of Miami Hillel. The opportunity to take a more active role in community building and civic engagement led him to his current role as founding Executive Director of Repair the World Miami. Janu is an alumnus of the Pardes Summer Program and Bend the Arc’s Selah Leadership Program for Jews of Color, as well as a member of the ROI Community and a current Wexner Field Fellow.
Ginna Green
Ginna is a political strategist, writer and consultant, and, until June 2020, the Chief Strategy Officer at Bend the Arc: Jewish Action. There she led the work of the communications, advocacy, electoral, rapid response and racial equity teams from 2018-2020, a period of unprecedented white nationalism, antisemitism and authoritarianism in American life.
Prior to Bend the Arc, Ginna was Managing Director of the Democracy Collaborative at ReThink Media. At ReThink, she strengthened the communications capacity of groups working on money in politics, fair and diverse courts, and voting rights. Before joining ReThink, Ginna worked at the Center for Responsible Lending for several years, including during the Great Recession and foreclosure crisis, and worked to pass the California Homeowner Bill of Rights and the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act. She has also worked for Full Court Press Communications, The OpEd Project, SPIN Academy, and the South Carolina Appleseed Legal Justice Center.
Ginna is a frequent speaker and writer on democracy, race, racism in the Jewish community, Jewish community diversity, and leadership, and has been published in the Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, Newsweek, Salon, and more. Ginna sits on the boards of Women’s March, Political Research Associates, the Jews of Color Initiative, and Bend the Arc: Jewish Action. An alum of the Jeremiah Fellowship and the Selah Leadership Program, and a 2019 Schusterman Fellow, Ginna is a native southerner and the mother of four amazing kids.
Gamal Palmer
Gamal is the Senior Vice President of the Jewish Federation of Greater Los Angeles where he oversees myriad leadership programs, board and professional development for a 200-person workforce. Gamal is the Founder and CEO of Global Eye Entrepreneurs, an organization creating pipelines to economic and sociopolitical power for male entrepreneurs of color. Earlier in his career, Gamal co-founded the New York-based Theater Arts collective, “Company Cypher,” which missioned to transform the conversation around skin–tone prejudice and racism.
Gamal earned an MFA and a Post-Graduate Associate from the Yale Schools of Drama and Management (SOM) in Business Organization & Leadership Development. While at Yale, Gamal co-created and lectured the study-abroad course, “Arts in Action: Theater and Public Health in Swaziland and South Africa’ and the graduate school program, ‘The Quest for Social Justice Through Music Theater and Religion in Tanzania’. In 2014, Gamal served as a Los Angeles Global Justice Fellow. Gamal delivered a TEDx Talk on the intersection of art and social impact at Occidental College. In September of 2018, Gamal will be an ICAP Fellow at the Aspen Institute. A native of Philadelphia, Gamal is the youngest of nine children and was highly influenced by his activist parentage.
Meet our Grant Advisory Group
The Grant Advisory Group’s contributions of time and knowledge allow them to ensure a fair and thoughtful decision-making process for grant awards, further develop leadership skills, and strengthen the Jews of Color field through their work. Together with staff, the group reviews grant applications and makes funding recommendations.
Danielle Natelson
Danielle has spent more than a decade working at the intersection of leadership and learning across the Jewish communal landscape, most currently as the Design Strategist at UpStart in Los Angeles. For six years, Danielle cultivated relationships with students, community partners, and stakeholders at Hillel at UCLA, resulting in the engagement of nearly 2000 Jewish students annually. There, she piloted a new strategy for training leaders, launched pluralistic Jewish learning environments, and scaled immersive experiences to reach broad audiences. Additionally, Danielle has leveraged her passion for music and Israeli dance to enrich Jewish communities through the arts in her work with Camp Ramah, the Bureau of Jewish Education, and synagogues and Jewish day schools in Orange County.
Danielle’s intersectional identity has positioned her to contribute to efforts of diversity, equity and inclusion in the Jewish community, earning her a selection in the second cohort of Bend the Arc’s Selah Leadership Program for Jews of Color. An alumna of UC Berkeley, Hebrew University, Pardes, and other fellowships, Danielle is a proud learner and relishes opportunities to immerse in our rich tradition.
Amanda Ryan
Amanda Ryan joined the Tri-Faith Initiative in January 2019, serving as a Program Director. While obtaining her Religious Studies degree at the University of Nebraska at Omaha, she interned with a local interfaith nonprofit, Project Interfaith, which sparked her passion for interfaith work. She is currently a Sociology MA Candidate at UNO, completing her degree in 2019. Her research interests include religion in public life and politics, human rights, race and religion, and social change. Presently, she is working on a research project about Latino Jewish identity and code-switching, as well as writing podcast reviews for the Religious Studies Project.
In 2018, Amanda was selected to be a Jew v’Nation Fellow for the Union for Reform Judaism (URJ). The fellowship brought together 16 non-white Jewish professionals to grow community, engage in professional development, and create change for the larger Reform community. As a result, Amanda and three other fellows are creating professional development trainings for URJ-affiliated synagogues centered on the importance of culturally-responsive curriculum and teaching within synagogues. Amanda has given presentations on religious diversity acceptance in Omaha, participated on panels about young professional spirituality, and has provided research assistance to local UU congregations. Amanda is a member of the American Academy of Religions, chair of Young Jewish Omaha, and serves on the Omaha Public Schools Board of Education through 2020.
Yoshi Silverstein
Yoshi is a Chinese-Ashkenazi-American Jew and an educator, coach, speaker, husband, and father. At present he is Director of the JOFEE Fellowship at Hazon, the Jewish Lab for Sustainability; and founder of Mitsui Collective, which builds individual and communal resiliency through movement, wellness, and nature connection practices through a Jewish lens. Yoshi holds close to two decades of experience in both Jewish and secular outdoor, food, farming, and environmental education; and earned his Masters Degree in Landscape Architecture at the University of Maryland with a thesis focusing on landscape journey and experience in Jewish outdoor learning environments. He has been a cast member of Kaleidoscope Project’s “What Does Jewish Look Like to You” monologue series and an ELI Talks speaker; and is an alumnus of Selah (Cohort 14, Jewish Leaders of Color), the Dorot Fellowship, and the PresenTense NYC Accelerator for Social Entrepreneurship.
Yoshi holds certificates in Spiritual Entrepreneurship (from Columbia Business School through GLEAN Network), permaculture design, ecovillage design, and environmental education. He is a member of the Selah Advisory Council, and is a founding member of the Repair the World NYC Advisory Board and the UpStart Alumni Advisory Council. Yoshi is also a CrossFit coach and movement teacher, 2nd degree blackbelt, and aficionado of Chinese Roast Duck.
Nate Looney
Nate is an American Jewish University alum, agricultural entrepreneur, diversity strategist and US Army Veteran.
Nate joined the US Army National Guard in 2003. Nate was part of rescue efforts during Hurricane Katrina in 2005 and deployed to Iraq in 2008. In 2015, he graduated with his B.A. in Business from American Jewish University. Nate has been featured as a veteran farmer on the “Lydia Celebrates America” program on PBS and LA Fox Morning News. He has been a guest speaker for USDA, United States Coast Guard, Kaiser Permanente, FoodTank Summit and Virginia Tech. Nate has been featured in the Jewish Journal, Experience Life Magazine and USA Today.
He is a Jeremiah fellow and a Bend the Arch Selah JOC Cohort alum. Nate is passionate about diversity, equity and inclusion. He is currently the Jews of Color (JOC) recruiter and diversity strategist at Avodah and speaks publicly about intersectionality and diversity across multiple sectors.
