Welcoming New JCA Members!

Welcome Shira!

Shira Wein is a recent transplant to the Amherst area, as she is currently completing her first year as an Assistant Professor of Computer Science at Amherst College. She is originally from the Philadelphia area and comes to us from Washington D.C., where she completed her PhD (at Georgetown University). Shira enjoys music and the arts broadly, as well as going for walks and exploring the area.

Welcome Greene Family!

Rabbi James, Jen, Talyah, and Kol are excited to be joining the JCA community. They moved to Stafford Springs, CT in 2016 and live on a small homestead there. James serves as the CEO at Jewish Family Service of Western Massachusetts in Springfield. Jen is the Program and Operations Associate for the Association of Reform Jewish Educators. Talyah is currently a junior in high school, is a three-season varsity runner,  and is an active music and drama participant. Kol is an eighth-grader who loves to play softball and plays the clarinet. They are both madrichot for B'yachad Springfield - the community religious school. In their free time, they all enjoy hiking, gardening, and going to see live theater.

Welcome Sasha!

Sasha Conley is in the third year of a doctorate in clinical psychology at Antioch University. She is a Hampshire College alum (F12) living in Leverett, and is originally from Mount Kisco, New York. Once upon a time, she was a union carpenter and built a branch of the New York Public Library. As a chatty New Yorker, Sasha enjoys that Jewish law is founded on lively debate. She values Judaism as a way to wrestle with ethics and tell wild old stories. At JCA, she hopes to find calm, make friends, learn, celebrate, and grieve together in community. Sasha is excited by the ways Judaism connects us to ancestors far away and to one another in the here and now. She likes creative writing, drawing, embroidery, sewing, reading, genealogy, and roller skating. 

Welcome Bryna and Chris!

Bryna Diamond (she/her) and Chris Langford (she/her) live in Greenfield with Arnie, their tiny rescue dog, and Miranda, their reclusive rescue cat. Chris works at UMass Amherst as a grants administrator. Thanks to Chris, their kitchen garden is vibrant and productive. Bryna is retired from teaching high school math and robotics. For the last year, she’s been a mentor in the Lunch Buddies Program of BBBS (formally Big Brothers Big Sisters). She just joined the Chesed committee.

Welcome Lara-Cahoon Family!

Yaki, an interfaith chaplain, converted to Judaism as a young adult before learning the big family secret - that the maternal line was Ashkenazi, a history lost during WWII. Olivia, a public health nurse, was raised Catholic in Japan with a wide range of spirituality and has Sephardic ancestry. Mauro, almost age 6, is just coming for snacks and will gladly share his expertise on bearded dragons and bicycle riding. We live in Northfield with a lot of animals where we care for Grandpa. We enjoy chickening, gardening, hiking, singing, traveling to Long Island, wood working, and volunteering at Stone Soup Cafe. Though you don't see us often, we hope to grow in faith & community at JCA.

Welcome Beth and Dan!

Beth Falk and Dan Herman recently pulled up their 32-year-old roots in Katonah, NY and moved to Northampton, mid-way between their son’s family in northern Vermont and their daughter in Providence, RI.  Beth is a clinical psychologist, working part-time, and Dan, an emeritus professor of social work at Hunter College, continues to do work focused on addressing the needs of mentally ill unhoused people. Beth and Dan are both musicians and songwriters and hope to make new musical connections in the area. Hiking, reading, writing (Beth), cooking (Dan), and community service are among their interests, and they spend as much time as possible with their 5- and 3-year-old granddaughters in Vermont.

Welcome Shiri, Gonen, and Michael!

Shiri and Gonen Dori-Hacohen moved to the Amherst area in 2011. They were both born in Israel; Shiri was raised partly in Israel and partly in the US. They live in Amherst center with their two children, Gavahn (10) and Korrenne (4); the family speaks Hebrew at home. Gonen is an Associate Professor in the Communication Department at UMass Amherst. Shiri is a PhD alum of UMass, and is an Assistant Professor at the School of Computing at the University of Connecticut. Gonen enjoys running and watching (American) football. Shiri enjoys rotating hobbies over time; currently, painting, making jewelry, and building with LEGO. 

Rabbi Dr. Michael Greenwald is originally from Kingston, New York, the same town in which his grandfather was born.  He earned his B.A. in Astronomy from the University of Pennsylvania in 1970 and went on to rabbinic studies at Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion, first in Jerusalem and then in Cincinnati, earning his Master of Arts in Hebrew Letters in 1973 and receiving smichah in 1975.  He continued his studies at Boston University while serving congregations in Milford and Melrose, Massachusetts.  He earned his Ph.D. in New Testament and Christian Origins in 1989 and taught at the University of Vermont, Virginia Polytechnic and State University (Virginia Tech), and Swarthmore College before taking a full-time position in the Department of Religious Studies at St. Lawrence University in Canton, New York where he taught for 28 years.  He retired from St. Lawrence in 2017 and moved to Amherst in 2021.  He also served for 40 years as a volunteer naturalist for the Appalachian Mountain Club and is an avid birder and hiker.   He is married to Dr. Claudia Setzer, who is a retiring professor of Religious Studies at Manhattan College in the Bronx, New York.

Welcome Alexis, Billy, and Steven!

Alexis Brooks and Billy Spitzer moved to Hadley 2 years ago from the Boston area. Billy, originally from Long Island, is now Executive Director of the Hitchcock Center for the Environment in Amherst. He loves all outdoor activities—  skiing, swimming, running, biking, camping and hiking.  Alexis, originally from Manhattan, is an adult psychiatrist in private practice in Northampton. She also likes the outdoors, does Improv Comedy, is on the Tikkun Olam Committee, volunteers at the Amherst Survival Center and loves being with friends. They love reading and movies. They take great joy in their two young adult children, one in CA, one in Philly. 

Dr. Steven Markow is originally from Newton, Mass.  An Optometrist who practiced in Florida for 15 years, before moving to South Hadley in1997. He opened Village Eye Care in 2001, then in 2022, sold the practice and is now retired. Retirement hobbies have yet to be determined, but hopes to get in more hiking, sailing, listening to music, traveling, a few Red Sox games, and community involvement.

Welcome Lisa and Wendy!

Lisa Kosanovic is an engineer who has been living in Amherst since the late 1980s. She and her husband, a retired UMass professor, divide their time between Amherst - where they raised their two sons - and their lake house in the northern Adirondacks. Lisa is a member of the Tikkun Olam committee. In her spare time she enjoys writing fiction, and she is learning French.

Welcome Thelma, Kathy, and David!

Thelma Fenster grew up in New York and taught French and Medieval Studies at Fordham University. She was married to Jim Craddock, an fish biologist at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution. She moved to Amherst at the end of 2022 and lives at the Applewood community. 

Kathy and David Pollard recently moved here after 26 years in central PA (where Penn State is). David is a retired paleoclimatologist who still works a bit with colleagues at UMASS. Kathy works in the research department of the American College of Lifestyle Medicine. She is a nutrition instructor and still teaches occasionally through University of New England. David surfs and snow boards; Kathy doesn't; she does yoga. They both love hiking, and keep meaning to learn Mah Jongg. The Pollards have two grown children, both married, who hopefully will come back to settle in Massachusetts. They live with their two cats in Amherst Woods.

Welcome Rachel, Dan, Ilene, and Terry!

Rachel Magin and her fiancee, Dan Corkran live in Amherst with their two dogs, Roni and Ciara. Rachel is a psychologist at Aviva Psychology Services in Northampton, and Dan is in a UMass Ph.D program in hydrogeology. Rachel and Dan enjoy attending services at JCA and love the outdoors, hiking, camping, walking the dogs and traveling.

Ilene and Terry Rosenfeld have been South Hadley residents since 2013 and moved here from Yardley, PA., to be near their daughter, Amy Sweeting and her family in Amherst.  Born in Trenton, NJ, the Rosenfelds raised their two children in NJ and PA. Terry is a volunteer at The Yiddish Book Center, a stamp collector since he was 12, and is on the South Hadley Conservation Committee;  Ilene is active in Hadassah, enjoys playing Mah Jongg, goes to basic fitness and yoga classes at the South Hadley Senior Center, and is in two book clubs. They both take peer-moderated seminars through the Five Colleges Learning in Retirement program.