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Husband and wife team of Russel and Rori Picker Neiss bringing different aspects of Jewish learning to Limmud Winnipeg
By MYRON LOVE Rori Picker and Rusell Neiss say they are excited about their upcoming first visit to Winnipeg. The couple, Jewish educators – originally from New York, who have been living and working in St. Louis for the past ten years – will be here on the weekend of March 9-10 – as presenters at our community’s 14th annual Limmud Fest.
Russel Neiss is promising Limmud attendees that those attending his presentation will be in the first audience to view the digitized version of “The Story of Purim,” an award winning Jewish educational filmstrip which is part of a recently rediscovered lost cache produced by the NY Bureau of Jewish Education in the 1950s.
“We’ll view the slides and table-read the script together as we see how much the field of Jewish engagement and education has (and hasn’t) changed over the last 70 year,” notes Russel Neiss.
Russel is a 2005 graduate of City University of New York. The recipient – in 2020, of the prestigious Covenant Award (which recognizes educators who have made a noticeable impact on Jewish lives through innovative educational practices and models), served for several years as vice-principal of a Jewish day school in the New York area.
In 2014, Russel changed careers. He became a software engineer specializing in the development of software programming for Jewish educators for an organization called Sefaria. The nonprofit organization is dedicated to digitizing the entire body of Jewish religious writings in order to make them available so that anyone can engage with the textual treasures of our tradition.
“A couple of years ago,” he reports, “I came across a cache of film strips produced by the New York Bureau of Jewish Education in the 1950s. These films would have been shown to students in the 1950s and ‘60s. They have not been viewed for more than 60 years.”
At Limmud, he will be showing a film called “The Story of Purim.” “We’ll view the slides and table-read the script together as we see how much the field of Jewish engagement and education has (and hasn’t) changed over the years,” he says.
His second presentation – on Sunday afternoon – will focus on “what the atheist computer scientist Richard Stallman can teach us about how Torah learning can thrive in the world today while delving into the interplay between Hacker Culture, the Free Software Movement and the teachings of great Jewish thinkers like Rabbi Akiva, Rabbi Moshe Feinstein and Rebbe Nachman of Breslov.”
Rori Picker Neiss will also be doing two presentations – one of which will be a study of leadership as exhibited by Moshe Rabbenu in the matter of the Golden Calf. For those who may not know or remember the story in the Torah, some days after leaving Egypt, Moshe climbed Mount Sinai to commune with Hashem. After some time had gone by and he didn’t return, the frightened Hebrews, believing that he wasn’t coming back, gathered together everything they had that was made of gold and created a golden calf to worship – an act of blasphemy that resulted in severe divine consequences – including the Israelites having to wander in the desert for 40 years until the last of the offending generation had died out.
“What we can take away from this episode,” Rori observes, “and what Hashem made clear to Moshe- is that leadership is not about the leader and fame and glory. Leadership should be about doing what is in the best interests of the people.”
Her second presentation will be an exploration of what the early rabbis thought about Jesus and Christianity as seen through a censored Rabbinic passage.
Rori Picker Reiss has the distinction of being one of the first half dozen Orthodox women to be ordained – through the Yeshivat Maharat organization – founded in 2009 – to serve as clergy.
“I welcomed the opportunity to study Talmud and our religious texts,” she says of her decision to enroll in the Maharat program. ‘My ordination presented me with a number of different ways to serve our community.”
In St. Louis Maharat Rori served as Director of Programming, Education and Community Engagement at the modern Orthodox Bais Abraham Congregation. She was also Rabbi in Residence at Holy Communion Episcopal Church, chair of the cabinet of Interfaith partnership of Greater St. Louis and a member of the Board of Trustees for the Parliament of the World’s Religions.
Previously, she worked as acting Executive Director for Religions for Peace-USA, program coordinator for the Jewish Orthodox Feminist Alliance, assistant director of Interreligious Affairs for the American Jewish Committee, and secretary for the International Jewish Committee on Interreligious Consultations.
While there may be some among the Orthodox community who may be uncomfortable with the concept of women serving as clergy, Rori reports that she was generally well-received in St. Louis and was able to build many relationships both within the Orthodox and the wider communities.
Rori and Russel have recently moved back to New York City where Rori has been appointed the Senior Vice-President for Community Relations for the Jewish Council for Public affairs.
For more information about this year’s Limmud and to register, please visit www.limmudwinnipeg.org or contact coordinator@limmudwinnipeg.org or 204-557-6260
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First year medical student Tim Rozovsky founds new association for local Jewish medical students
By MYRON LOVE In the face of a concerning surge in antisemitism over the past nearly three years, I am happy to report a good news story in that regard. Tim Rozovsky, the founder of the new Jewish Medical Students’ Association of Manitoba, reports that he and his fellow Jewish students enrolled in the University of Manitoba’s Max Rady College of Medicine are not experiencing any significant issues involving antisemitism.
Hopefully, the matter of the notorious Med school Valedictorian who used his podium to attack Israel was a one-off.
“My goal in forming the Jewish Medical Students’ Association of Manitoba,” says the first year medical student, “was to create a safe, supportive environment for my fellow Jewish medical students.”
He reports that the current first year class at the school has eight Jewish students – an increase over more recent years – with maybe a dozen more in the other years.
For a new medical student, Rozovsky already has an impressive resume. He was born in Russia and grew up in Israel. After the completion of his army service in 2018, the then-22-year-old rejoined his parents, Dr. Katya and Alexander, who had moved to Winnipeg a few years before.
Prior to coming to Winnipeg, Rozovsky had completed a personal trainer program out of The Academic College at Wingate in Jerusalem. Some readers may know the young man from his work as a Master Personal Trainer at the Rady JCC.
Shortly after arriving here, he enrolled in a kinesiology program at the University of Winnipeg. He graduated with a BKin Honours in 2023 and did post graduate work at the University of Manitoba. Last fall, he received his MSc in Physiology and Pathophysiology – earning two gold medals, along with 32 awards and scholarships in the process.
Rozovsky says that it was his mother who inspired him to pursue a career in medicine. Dr. Katya Rozovsky is an associate professor at the University of Manitoba and an attending radiologist, specializing in pediatric diagnostic imaging.
(Tim also adds that his wife, Irina Gelzin, whom he married about a year ago, is training to be a nurse.)
Insofar as the Jewish Medical Students’ Association of Manitoba is concerned, Rozovky reports that the group gets together multiple times a year. One of its programs was a joint Chanukah celebration with the Jewish Physicians Association of Manitoba.
There was also a joint program with the Christian Medical and Dental Students’ Association of Manitoba.
“More recently, we have been helping prospective Jewish medical students with their applications,” he says. “Hopefully we will be able to get together over the summer with the incoming Jewish students.”
As to his own future plans, Rozovsky notes that it is too early for him to be deciding on a specialty. “My goal,” he says, “is to work hard and get good grades and become the best doctor that I can be.”
Local News
Gray Academy to Represent Manitoba at National Reach for the Top Competition
By NOAH STRAUSS Posted June 6) Gray Academy’s Reach for the Top team is headed to Moncton, New Brunswick, to represent Manitoba at the National Reach for the Top tournament.
Reach for the Top is a Canadian school league that quizzes teenagers on a variety of different topics, from science and history to pop culture. Reach started out in 1961 in Vancouver, where a local CBC station broadcasted the new show; it eventually became a national broadcast starting in 1966. Alex Trebek, who famously hosted Jeopardy!, started out by hosting Reach for the Top.
Gray Academy’s very own team, made up of Grade 7 and 8 students, will travel to Moncton, New Brunswick, to compete as Team Manitoba. By winning the provincial Reach tournament, they secured their spot in the national competition.
Faculty members at Gray Academy are very supportive of the program. The Jewish Post spoke with three different staff members at the school. Coach and high school teacher Danielle Miller says she is excited for the trip; although she will not be accompanying the team herself, shehas coached them all year.
“This year we had over 20 students come to the club to join us, they practice twice a cycle at lunch,” Miller said. Due to the large turnout this year, two teams had to be formed. At lunch practices, students split into two teams of four where each player has a buzzer. The two teams compete to see who can answer the most questions correctly.
One of the two teams did exceptionally well at various tournaments throughout the year and will be traveling to nationals as the sole team representing Manitoba.
Co-coach Micah Doerksen described Reach as a great academic competition where young minds are tested on various topics through quick,fast-paced questions.
High school guidance counselor Lindsey Leipsic said, “We have athletes, non-athletes, we have students who are really involved and students who are not as involved at school, and we have quiet leaders, and we’ve seen friendships be built in Reach.” Some of her favorite memories of Reach involve seeing students from across Winnipeg come to Gray Academy and bond with one another. Lev Chisick, who is competing at nationals, agreed, saying, “Moncton is going to strengthen our school spirit and make us a better team.”
As the junior team makes their way to Moncton, the senior team will head to provincials. Later this week, students from the senior team will travel to Virden, Manitoba, to compete at the provincial level. The team qualified after placing high enough at their most recent tournament, which took place at St. Paul’s.
Confidence is high as the school heads into these final tournaments. When Nath Goldenberg, who is also competing at nationals, was asked what he is most looking forward to, his answer was short and sweet:“Winning.”
