We’re in a moment of grief and loss. We’re also in a moment of strength, creativity, growth and meaning making. How might that inform the way we approach our roles as educators? As Jewish educators?

We invite educators working in all areas of Jewish education to join Melissa Merin and Leora Wolf-Prusan for a 90-minute session to gain deeper understandings of the complexities of intergenerational, intersectional, and intersystemic harm and healing. Our goal is to create a shared language from which we may build an awareness of how factors of trauma (communal trauma/violence, systemic forms of oppression (racism), inter and intra personal as well as environmental) might show up in educational spaces — for youth and adults alike.

Melissa Merin (she/hers) has been an educator and Restorative Justice practitioner in the Bay Area for over 20 years. She has worked extensively in early childhood education with students, their caregivers and their teachers, supporting families and teachers to embed the principles and practices of restorative justice into their teaching and parenting. For the last five years, she has focused her restorative justice and positive discipline work at home, parenting her own child, while also training and facilitating restorative justice processes for individuals, schools and a variety of nonprofit organizations. Melissa holds a Master’s degree in Educational Leadership from Mills College.

Leora Wolf-Prusan, EdD (she/hers) is an educator, trainer, facilitator, community builder and bridger. Currently she is the School Mental Health Lead & Training Specialist for SAMHSA’s Pacific Southwest Mental Health Technology Transfer Center, the project director for the School Crisis Recovery & Renewal Project via the National Child Traumatic Stress Network, and the Director of Partnerships & Teaching at the Center for Applied Research Solutions (CARS). She provides consulting and training around issues related to trauma-informed & resilience-oriented leadership, organizational & school climate and positive youth development, educator mental health and wellness, grief in the workplace, anti racism & health, among much more. Leora received a BA in International Relations and a BA in Spanish with a minor in Social & Ethnic Relations from the University of California, Davis; a teaching credential from Mills College in Oakland, California; and an EdD in Educational Leadership from the University of California, Los Angeles. And yes, she is related to all the other fabulous Wolf-Prusans.

Registration is now closed.

All trainings at Jewish LearningWorks are subsidized by our generous donors and are offered free of charge to people furloughed or laid off from Jewish organizations. To arrange a cost adjustment, please email liora@jewishlearning.works.