Our religious school, Beit Sefer, has a Director and two additional teachers:
AARC Member Clare Kinberg has served as Beit Sefer Director since the 2015-2016 school year. She also teaches the K’tanim, the youngest class. Clare believes in project-based learning–read more about that on the Beit Sefer overview page.
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.
Shlomit Cohen was born in Israel and raised in a (Habonim Dror) kibbutz. She went to a high school of art; and receieved her Bachelor Arts from Hebrew University in Jerusalem where she majored in Archeology. Shlomit worked as an archaeologist, excavated in Zippory, and later worked in museums in Jerusalem. She completed a yoga teacher training course before moving to the U.S. in 2002 and has taught yoga and Hebrew since then. At present, Shlomit lives in Ann Arbor with her two children, and many animals. She is pursuing her M.A. in Jewish Educational Leadership through Jewish Theological Seminary (JTS). While she is not studying, you can find her gardening, going on adventures, or teaching AARC Yeladim class on Sunday mornings.
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 second year teaching for Beit Sefer.
Several teenage members of AARC assist as madrichim (guides).
