JOFA

Judge Rachel Freier has helped dozens of Orthodox Jewish women in New York City get training and start work as emergency medical technicians. In doing so, she challenged her community’s conception of the role women can play in public and professional life. (To learn more about the full story that led to the formation of Ezras Nashim check out the documentary film 93Queen.)

It’s time for systemic change to end the #Agunah crisis.

Latest interview by Girl Museum Inc. with Adi Topolosky: I realized that even though I was only 11 when I wrote the article, I can make a difference. I hope my choice to speak up helps other girls know how important it is to stand up and never give up. We may be young but we could make a difference by using our voices to stand up for what we believe in. Dahlia Topolosky

Join us for our latest webinar in partnership with JScreen: Saving Lives Through Genetic Testing taking place on April 19 at 12pm EST! Register using this link: https://jofa.wufoo.com/forms/z1uouvig0qte5ts/ NOTE: You must register in order to receive the link to join us.

Call for volunteer readers! Join JOFA for our women-led Megillat Ruth reading on Thursday, May 13 at 2pm EDT. We are looking for volunteers to read sections of the Megillah. Please let us know if this is something you would be interested in participating in by filling out this form: https://forms.gle/4vQywA9ZxkdWj5wZA Click the event link below for more information.

In the last decades, many young religious women were told that voice was a hopeless pursuit at worst, a secret hobby at best. People didn’t look at it for women as having a career, Schwartz says. They always told us, ‘You only have half an audience.’ But with Instagram, young religious women could begin taking initiative and performing and publicizing their own music online. Avital Chizhik Goldschmidt

Latest from the JOFA Blog on Parshat Shemini: "Our manifestation of awe is when our knees and faces touch the ground. Without that precious pause to soak in kedusha, we are at risk of being like Nadav and Avihu and becoming consumed by the fire rather than its light. May our nefilah (falling) be our tefillah. And may we, too, have that universal healing moment that took place at Har Sinai. " by Emily Goldberg Winer

As we near Yom HaShoah, we are once again sharing this piece from the JOFA Blog: Dr. Peggy J. Kleinplatz and Dr. Weindling are searching for first-hand accounts and information on Holocaust survivors' amenorrhea and infertility.

Mazel tov to Rachel Wainer Apter on her recent nomination as a justice of the New Jersey Supreme Court. (This past fall Rachel spoke at JOFA's siyum mishna and shloshim commemoration for Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, z"l.) The idea of tikkun olam is the most important part of Judaism, or just as important as Shabbat, kashrut, or some of other things that are more closely associated with traditional observance, Apter explained.