Hebrew Union College Celebrates Ninth Rikma Cohort and First Jewish Democratic Education Labs Graduates

Joy filled the Taube Family Campus as friends and family gathered to celebrate the ninth cohort of Rikma, Hebrew Union College's specialization program in Pluralistic Jewish Education and Educational Leadership, offered in partnership with the Melton Centre for Jewish Education at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Hosted by the Hebrew Union College's Department of Education and Professional Development, the ceremony also honored the first 25 graduates of the new Jewish Democratic Education Labs program, a milestone worth celebrating.

The twelve Rikma graduates work in classrooms, youth movements, community organizations, cultural institutions, and the world of educational tourism. What unites them is a shared belief that education can change society. They leave the ceremony ready to bring pluralism, democratic values, and bold, values-driven leadership to communities across Israel, and to help shape the next generation of learners.

Michal Muszkat-Barkan, Ph.D., Director of the Department of Education and Professional Development, focused on what the graduates can bring to society. " I believe it matters that we have chosen to celebrate tonight. To lift our eyes and recognize what we have built: an educational community, new initiatives, meaningful relationships, and a shared language. Perhaps these are our islands. Not places to hide from reality, but places from which we can go out and engage with it."

It was a charge that Dean Nachman Shai made explicit as he addressed them. "At a time when Israeli society is searching for its way, remember another teaching of our sages: 'B'makom she'ein anashim, hishtadel lihyot ish.' 'Where there are no leaders, strive to be one.'"

For graduate Noa Shalit, the program offered something rare in the pace of modern life. "For me and my fellow students, studying at the College gave us a place where we could breathe," she said. "A place to step away from the relentless rush of everyday life and the endless stream of WhatsApp messages, and engage with the questions that shape our lives."

The curriculum, she explained, was as wide-ranging as it was reflective. "Together, we studied Talmud and AI. We learned how to formulate essential, thought-provoking questions. We explored educational philosophies, from Dewey to Lam. We learned how to conduct action research, and how to become more reflective, more aware, and more intentional in our educational practice."

But the deepest lesson was one of character. "More than anything, we learned to become people of hope: people who teach hope and inspire hope in our students and those we educate. We learned to create spaces where it is safe to make mistakes, to ask difficult questions, to explore uncertainty, and to sit together with discomfort. And to emerge on the other side believing that if this is possible here, within our own community of learners, then it is possible in Israeli society as well."

That conviction, that a school can be a place where Jewish and democratic values are lived rather than only taught, is at the heart of the program whose first graduates were honored alongside the Rikma cohort. Dr. Nimrod Smilansky Friedman, Educational Director of the Jewish Democratic Education Labs, described its ambition plainly. "We are not simply another professional development program. Together with you, we seek to take responsibility for the school as a cultural space that shapes Jewish and democratic identity, intentionally and thoughtfully."

Looking beyond the day's accomplishments, the speakers turned from what had been accomplished to what lay ahead. Jack, Joseph and Morton Mandel Provost Judah Cohen, Ph.D., ended his remarks with a call to keep moving. "At this graduation, we are seated, but not complacent. We are not pausing: instead, let us use this time to look around, to gather strength from this Community: those who love and support us; and to continue, asking: What will we do next? What will we do next?"

Muszkat-Barkan closed her message with a passage from this week's Torah portion, Chayei Sarah, and the figure of Rebecca. "Abraham sought to secure the future through loyalty to family and homeland. But that future also became possible because of a question that was never part of his instructions, and because of a woman who said, 'I will go,' and began a journey of her own.

"And that is our task: to pass on a story we believe in, while nurturing people who are free to choose how they will carry that story forward.

"So what question is still waiting for us to find the courage to ask? And what mission are we ready to embrace today with the words, 'I will go'?"