By Andrew Adler
Community Editor
Jessie Gindea’s exceptionally deep experience as a Jewish educator can be summarized in three of her favorite words: joy, awe and gratitude. “Those are three concepts that guide everything I do in life,” she says, dynamics she’ll bring to her new position as Executive Director of Jewish Learning Experience – Louisville’s multilayered, fundamentally reconceived framework connecting elementary, middle and high-school-age students with their Judaism.
“In the space of Jewish education — especially in the world we live in right now — we need to find the joy and awe in our traditions, our liturgy, in holidays and Shabbat, and in each other,” Gindea said during a recent Zoom interview. “So, the idea of being able to build spaces for joyful, awe-filled Jewish education is literally my dream job.”
Her background and enthusiasm impressed JLE from the outset.
“We said it was going to be somebody who wanted to build into the community, who had the experience being involved with a startup,” said Carol Jones, co-chair of the JLE board. “That requires a particular kind of energy and risk tolerance — and Jessie has been part of things like that.”
As applicants for the JLE spot were being vetted, Gindea’s credentials made an increasingly stronger case for her candidacy.
“Jessie has an openness and curiosity, so her résumé rose quickly,” Jones said. “She’s very articulate, and she asked fantastic questions,” about such subjects as budgets, and how we envisioned working together. And she was really interested in hearing about the community’s diversity — that we have multiple synagogues, and lots of unaffiliated people here.”
Fellow JLE co-chair Corey Shapiro is similarly enthused about Gindea’s selection, calling her “an extraordinary leader who will inspire students, families and the whole community.”
From her childhood summers attending Camp Young Judea through her most recent tenure as Lower School Director at Brooklyn’s Luria Academy Day School, Gindea has embraced her Jewish identity with passion and abiding curiosity.
She graduated in 2010 with dual undergraduate degrees from Columbia University (majoring in Near and Middle Eastern Studies) and the nearby Jewish Theological Seminary (B.A. in Modern Jewish Studies), going on to earn a master’s degree in Jewish Education from Hebrew College in Newton, Mass. through the Pardes Educator’s Program, and a master’s degree and Certificate of Advanced Jewish Studies from the Pardes Institute of Jewish Studies in Jerusalem.
Early in her career Gindea taught 5th grade and middle school Judaics, was a synagogue religious-school teacher and Kadima advisor and spent four years as Associate Director: Abroad Experiences at KAHAL: Your Jewish Home Abroad.
She’s done additional stints as the Senior Educator at Base Miami (a branch of Mem Global’s community-building initiative for young Jewish adults), Associate Director of Jewish Federation of North America’s National Young Leadership Cabinet, and spent a year as Interim Head of School at Miami’s Gordon School, a Jewish early childhood and Day School.
Gindea’s been at Luria Academy since August of last year, leading what her LinkedIn profile describes as “a team of 24 Lower School teachers while overseeing day-to-day operations and collaborating with the Educational Leadership Team to ensure cohesive, impactful programming,” with an emphasis on “fostering collaboration and active parental engagement.”
Married to Rabbi Adam Gindea, living in Brooklyn with their 10-year-old daughter and six-year-old son, her life sounds settled and satisfying. So, what’s the incentive to give it all up in favor of an untried gig in Louisville, Kentucky?
“It ignites me to build something,” she answers. “I love being able to be in a space where there is a gap, and we figure out how to fill it.”
Sometimes it’s within a Big Picture context.
“My avodah – my holy work in the world – is to make sure people know they belong as part of the Jewish people,” Gindea says. “They’re part of this big, beautiful thing that we have. And if I, in any way, am able to help people understand what their path to meaning or their path to connection might be, then our collective story becomes a little fuller, another person finding their place helps ensure that Jewish history isn’t just preserved, but continually renewed in every generation.”
Working alongside young people, inside and outside classroom settings, has provided Gindea with perspective on “leaning into people’s skills, engaging them and allow their divine spark to shine.”
Louisville will give her the opportunity to do just that.
“One thing I’m excited about is getting to know the kids and their families,” she emphasizes, “being able to say, ‘What things are interesting to you? What makes you feel good when you’re talking about Judaism?’ [Because] when kids are at all different kinds of schools and have had a full day of learning, I want to make sure that the time dedicated to learning and connecting with Judaism is full of joy and fun and awe.”
Gindea recognizes that traditional approaches to Jewish education may not necessarily dovetail within contemporary realities.
“Hebrew school is a model that’s really hard in today’s world,” she acknowledges. And I think as a camp person, part of what excites me is the idea of being able to do something a little different – making sure it’s engaging and multisensory.”
And, literally, delectable.
“One of the best classes I ever taught was the weekly Torah portion., Gindea recalled. “We made a recipe based on the commentary every week, so I called it Ta’ami Tanach – ‘a Taste of Tanach.’ I did it with middle schoolers. One of my favorites was for Parsha Bereshit [Genesis]. In the beginning, there’s a commentary on Adam and Eve being made from the same spine, and G-d pulled them apart in that way.
“We had double-stuffed Oreos and asked, how do you really pull these apart? So we were able to dive into this commentary that otherwise may have felt like, ‘Okay, we’re sitting on task, we’re looking at this commentary…’ etc. Instead, it was a full sensory experience. And what was really cool was that by the end of the year, the kids were responsible for teaching the class each week. It was so fun.”
Call it a prime demonstration of Gindea’s teaching philosophy.
“There are so many pathways to find your own Judaism,” she said. “Kids learn in all different ways. I happen to love to eat, so food often becomes a big part of what I do. There are infinite possibilities for them to learn from: Are we going on field trips? Are we cooking? Are we going to a local nursing home and learning and singing together? It could be anything, and that openness feels really exciting.” “Identifying the right person for the JLE position involved a deliberate, multilayered search process. The JLE board partnered with the New York City-based recruitment firm DRG Talent, which brought deep experience in working with non-profit organizations. The Gindeas had come to Brooklyn from Miami only about a year earlier, and they weren’t itching to make another big move so soon.
“But the more I heard about this position and the more I heard about the community — and the more people I started to speak with” — the prospect of relocating began to gain traction.
“You know that sometimes you make plans and God laughs — well, this truly felt like, ‘This is what I want to do: to have a community that is so open to change and so thoughtful about finding new ways to engage with Judaism,’” Gindea said. As she and her husband learned what qualities defined the city, “the more it felt like, ‘Wow, I want my kids to grow up in a community that’s so thoughtful and names the gaps — and then does the work to figure out how to fix them.’”
For a young woman steeped in an amalgam of modern Orthodox and what might be termed “progressive” Judaism, shaping a novel pathway for Jewish education seemed an exquisite match of skill, imagination, and professional timing.
“To know there’s a place where my experience and worldview can add to what this community already has, really felt like a calling,” Gindea says. “I want to contribute and be part of something that’s bigger than me.”
“She’s a creator and a builder,” Sara Klein Wagner, President and CEO of the Jewish Federation of Louisville and the Trager Family JCC, said of Gindea. Her hiring – made possible by support from the Jewish Heritage Fund — means “we have this remarkable opportunity to invest and bring a full-time Jewish educator to our community.”
Significantly, “with the way everything in our world is changing, we know our families and students need evolving services,” Wagner stressed. “They need flexible programming. They need different entry points. They move at different speeds. We’re fortunate to have found Jessie who can see an arc and the bi picture of connecting with kids where they are.”
Gindea’s dynamic applied to much of her earlier work with Base Miami, which she and her husband established after moving to that city eight years ago.
“There had just been a Pew [Research] study that there were all these young Jewish professionals living in a neighborhood called Brickell, and nobody was connecting with them. So, we built a model that made sense within the bigger Base movement, and then also for our family.
Heady times, those. “Our daughter was two years old when we started,” Gindea recalled, and she used to have two birthday parties: one for her kid friends and one for her grown-up friends, because we had people in our house six days a week. We built deep relationships with so many people who were seeking in all different ways. Knowing that we were a space that was not judgmental in any way about how they connected or observed Judaism – that they were welcome to belong exactly how they were at that moment – was powerful for both of us.”
And speaking of relationships, Gindea already has key Louisville allies in her corner.
“We said we’re going to support you as your board,” Jones promised. “We’ll be here to help you raise money, to help you set policy, and oversee the work you’ll be doing. But you are going to do it — we’re not going to micromanage you.”
Meanwhile, Gindea and her husband have already bought — unseen –a home in the Highlands — a neighborhood they toured during a single weekend visit to Louisville.
Rabbi Gindea is Vice President of Base and Rabbinic Innovation at Mem Global, “so he gets to oversee the Bases all over the country,” Jessie Gindea said.
They plan to move here in late December, happily anticipating the pleasure of an actual backyard. “In Brooklyn, it’s like there is no space,” she acknowledged with a laugh.
“Some of the values that are held in Louisville versus New York — outdoor space, slowing down — really speak to us,” she said. “In the pathway of awe, being able to take my morning coffee outside just makes my day much better.”