Louisville Native Lisa Eisen is in JWI’s 2013 class of Women to Watch

Each year, Jewish Women International selects a class of extraordinary Jewish women to honor for their achievements and honors them as Women to Watch. Louisville native Lisa Eisen was selected as a member of this year’s class and was honored at the JWI’s 13 annual celebration on December 9 in Washington, D.C.

Eisen is the national director of the Charles and Lyn Schusterman Family Foundation. According to the article by Susan Josephs on jwi.org, “Since 2001, she has spearheaded numerous projects for the 25-year-old, multimillion-dollar philanthropic network, which has become one of the leading proponents worldwide of innovative programs for young Jewish adults.

“Responsible for overseeing the foundation’s support of Hillel, BBYO, Moishe House and other prominent global Jewish organizations, Eisen has also jump-started additional new ventures, including the Israel on Campus Coalition, the Israel Institute, the national service organization Repair the World, and the iCenter, a cutting-edge initiative devoted to Israel education, for which she currently serves as board chair.”Dedicated to helping the Schusterman family realize their philanthropic vision, Eisen fills many roles as she helps organizations grow and realize their potential.

For Eisen, the daughter of Mona and Jay Brodsky, a summer in Israel in 1979 as a teen was the pivot point in her life. Josephs reported Eisen views it as a “pivot point” in her life, after which, she knew she wanted to “spend her life ‘working for the Jewish people.’”

She views her parents as role models, “who tirelessly volunteered for Israeli and Jewish causes and taught her to fight anti-Semitism,” Josephs wrote.

In high school, she was a leader in BBYO and USY, and at Yale University, where she was a history major, she was also active in Hillel and an advocate for the Jewish community and Israel.

“During college,” Josephs wrote, “Eisen interned for the American Israel Public Affairs Committee and later received her master’s degree in Israel and Middle East studies from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. At 28, she became the executive director of Project Interchange, an institute of the American Jewish Committee that organizes seminars in Israel for global leaders.”

Eisen and her husband, Mitch, have three children, Ariella, 20, Tamar, 18, and Jonah, 14.

 

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