Our religious school, Beit Sefer, has a Director and three teachers:
AARC Member Clare Kinberg has served as Beit Sefer Director since the 2015-2016 school year. She also teaches the Yeledim, our 3rd and 4th graders.
Clare has a Bachelor’s degree in education, and a Master’s degree in Library and Information Science. She has taught for many years in religious schools. She and her family moved to Michigan in 2003, via St. Louis, Brooklyn, Seattle and Eugene, OR. She was the founding editor of Bridges: A Jewish Feminist Journal, and worked for the journal for over twenty years. Clare has deep family connections to Reconstructionism; her brother, niece, and nephew are all Reconstructionist rabbis.
Clare and her wife Patti have two daughters, Zevi and Myisha. You can contact Clare here. Clare also serves as the Librarian for Temple Beth Emeth, and as editor and publisher of the Washtenaw Jewish News.
Marcy Epstein is our teacher for the K’tanim, our youngest students. Marcy E has taught English, composition and rhetoric, literature, language arts, and disability studies for over 25 years. She holds a Ph.D. in English Language and Literature with post-doctoral specialization in disability research and rehabilitative psychology After becoming Associate Professor of General & Developmental Education at Baker College in Flint, Michigan, Dr. Epstein served for years as Associate Publisher and Senior Editor of the award-winning Moment Magazine and Center for Creative Change. Currently she teaches in the University of Michigan Comprehensive Studies Program, as well as 826Michigan and FlyArt, two innovative and free writing, art, and problem-solving regional programs for youth.
Aaron Jackson is a passionate and experienced Jewish educator who has worked in the field for the past sixteen years. He strives to make each classroom experience as engaging and fun for students as possible. His interests/hobbies include board games, hiking, record collecting, comics, video games and more. This will be his third year teaching for Beit Sefer.
Shani Samuel, a University of Michigan student, will be teaching Hebrew at the Beit Sefer this year. It’s her first year back since she was a madricha (assistant teacher) to the Yeladim class during two of her high school years. Shani strives to make Hebrew learning as active as possible for her students, so that they are truly engaging with the language during lessons.
