Board of Directors
| Member | Location |
|---|---|
| Michael Berenbaum, PhD | Los Angeles, CA |
| Ruth P. Goldberg | Bryn Mawr, PA |
| Samara Hutman | Santa Monica, CA |
| Harry Pelz | Milwaukee, WI |
| Janis Sherman Popp | Palo Alto, CA |
| Barbara Tobin | Sebastopol, CA |
Staff Biographies
Gesher Calmenson, Founder, retired in 1995 from a 30–year career in publishing to work in Jewish education. In 2003 he founded the Remember Us Project. Mr. Calmenson is Education Director Emeritus of Dor Hadash Religious School, Congregation Ner Shalom, Cotati, California. He completed a Fellowship in Jewish Family Education (1999–2002). He served as Chairman of the Regional Educators Council, Bureau of Jewish Education, San Francisco (2001–2002), and was a leader in Jewish Family Room, a multi–generation home–based family education program (2002–2005). He currently also serves on the coordinating committee of NESS, a program to encourage excellence in synagogue schools. Mr. Calmenson’s article, “Making Meaning From the Hebrew Letters,” appeared in Aleph–Bet: The Building Blocks of Creation: San Francisco, 2000. In addition to his work with the Remember Us Project, he also mentors bar/bat mitzvah classes and tutors special needs and gifted students.
Elly Cohen is the Project Administrator. She was formerly Outreach Coordinator for the seniors program at the Sonoma County Jewish Community Center. Elly has been a longtime active volunteer in the Jewish community, including serving as a cantorial soloist and music coordinator for her congregation, serving on the board of directors of several Jewish organizations, and teaching religious school and adult education classes.
Paula Simon, Associate Director, recently retired from her position as the Executive Director of the Milwaukee Jewish Council for Community Relations. Ms. Simon has been at the Council since September 1988, serving first as Associate Director and since April 1997 as Executive Director. She has been responsible for initiating a wide range of Council projects, including a variety of programs in cooperation with the Milwaukee Public Schools. Simon was instrumental in developing and securing funding for the Wisconsin Educators U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum Trip and Educational Seminar, designed to provide middle and high school teachers with the resources and knowledge to effectively teach about the Holocaust and the universal implications of this tragic historical event. More than 400 teachers from the state of Wisconsin have had the opportunity to participate in a one–day trip to the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington DC, as well attend pre and post–seminar workshops.
Paula has significant experience in the field of community relations. She served as the Secretary of the Interfaith Conference of Greater Milwaukee and on the Interfaith Conference Executive Committee and Cabinet. She was a founding member of the Milwaukee Clinic Protection Coalition and served on the Advisory Board of Anytown, Wisconsin. She has served on the Board of Directors of Wisconsin Citizen Action and on the Cathedral Center Advisory Committee. She also served as a member of the advisory board of Mosaic Partnership Milwaukee.
A Los Angeles native, Ms. Simon received her undergraduate degree in Social Welfare from the University of California, Berkeley. She earned a Masters Degree in Social Work from the University of Southern California, with an emphasis on Community Organization, Planning and Administration, and a Master of Arts in Jewish Communal Service from Hebrew Union College, Los Angeles. In 2004, she received an honorary doctorate in Jewish Communal Service from Hebrew Union College, recognizing her 25 years of service to the Jewish community.
From 1974–1979, Simon held an academic appointment at the University of Minnesota Center for Youth Development and Research. From 1980–83, she worked for Jewish Vocational Services, Career Development Services Department.
She is married to Howard A. Schoenfeld, and the mother of two adult daughters, Mara and Jamie, and stepmother to Haley. Howard and Paula are in the process of fulfilling a long–standing dream to move to Santa Rosa, where Howard, a turn–around and financial restructuring consultant, hopes to reinvent himself as a tasting room educator and Paula will use her expertise in Jewish communal service, systems and structures to develop relationships with national organizations, denominations and affiliate groups for Remember Us.
Barbara Tobin, MPA, Names Database Manager, has a background in Jewish communal work, nonprofit administration, and human resources management. She recently held the positions of Program Director for the Sonoma County Jewish Films Series, and Coordinator for the Bureau of Jewish Education’s Feast of Jewish Learning for Sonoma County. Ms. Tobin has a personal connection to the Holocaust: her great–aunt, Cora Berliner, chose to stay in Berlin in 1930, rather than join her family in the United States, so that she could continue her work with the Kindertransport. She is believed to have died at Bergen Belsen.