The Ohio State University is one of the largest state universities. Hillel is the center for Jewish life. OSU's Hillel is known on campus for the wide variety of exciting programming it produces. Inside of the building, there are numerous events daily. Programming includes educational, social, cultural, and religious programming. Weekly Shabbat services for the Reform and Conservative movements are held in the building Friday evenings. After services there is a free dinner. Over 100 students attend weekly. We offer weekly programming such as intramural basketball, volunteering options, kosher buffet dinners, and torah study.
Hillel is a place for Jewish students to gather regardless of their religious affiliation.


Staff (Who's who and what do they do)

Joseph Kohane - Executive Director
Joseph is the visionary of the institution. He is well respected in the Hillel world and deserves all the accolades he receives. He works very closely with the Senior Staff and assists them in developing the mission of our Hillel and passing it on to the other staff and eventually onto the students.

Misha Zinkow - Assistant Director and Rabbi
Misha supervises the covenant program, which is a program to develop leadership skills in future Jewish Communal Professionals. He is also a great resource when it comes to questions about holidays and Dvar Torah advice. He works with the Social Justice JCSC closely on AJWS programming.

Susannah Sagan - Development and Marketing Director
Susannah runs the "Critical Issues Series" in which we bring in big name speakers such as Marc Gafni, Carrie Fisher, Tom Gjelton, and Eli Wiesel. She advises the student board and is in charge of bringing in all the big bucks!

Debra Feld - Program Director
Debra supervises all the programming staff and is responsible for keeping us all on target. She also is very helpful in assisting individuals to work better together. She is in charge of putting the calendar together, and props to her because every other Hillel wants our calendar. She'll be missed next year when she moves to Cleveland!

Joan Koebel - Office and Building Manager
Joan is the glue that keeps this building together. She takes all the room requests, food requests and makes sure everything in the building is in top shape. There is a little known secret I have found out...Joan is the one who really runs the place!

Peggy Redmond - Administator and Accountant
Peggy keeps the books for us and makes sure we all get paid on time, and with the amount of staff we have that is no easy job.

Jonathan Strausberg - Program Associate
Jonathan works with many of our student leaders. Jonathan is the quirky yet cool guy in the office. He is also responsible for over seeing the quarterly socials and leadership development. When he is not at his desk you can find him either playing ping pong or watching The Simpsons.

Jennifer Ackerman - JCSC Fellow - Social Justice Coordinator
I do all of the Tzedek work at our Hillel especially working with the Black Jewish Dialogue, Jewish Queers, weekly volunteering, alternative Spring Break, and the Jewish a cappella group festival trips.  I'll be moving to New York this year to continue my work in social justice.

Ezra Post - JCSC Fellow - Portfolio Manager
Ezra was instrumental in getting students into the building. His main job was to call up students and invite them in for a free lunch. He was great at listening to the students and developing them and passing them off to other programming staff. 

Eve Oster - JCSC Fellow
Eve did a lot of tabling on campus and had a focus on Residence Halls programming. With a campus of so many students there is plenty of Res Hall programs to be done. She also worked with the Graduate and Young Professional Community as well.

She was also the resident expert on all pop culture!

Seth Rosenzweig - Senior JCSC Fellow
Seth along with Eve did a significant amount of tabling and also supervised the foundation fellows. His main programming areas were Greeks, Sports, Health, Wellness, Cultural Israel Programming. 

He's leaving Ohio to get himself a tan in sunny San Diego!

Engagement and Empowerment

There are more engagement students than empowerment students. The role of engagement falls on all of the four JCSCs. Each JCSC was their specific way of doing engagement. I do student engagement through community service opportunities. Students who have great leadership potential are candidates for empowerment. Too often, we do not empower students to the extent that is possible. As a JCSC, I do the majority of program planning. More room can be made for empowered students to take over programming.


Responsibilities (As a Fellow and staff member)

As the Social Justice JCSC Fellow, I advise six student groups. They include: