In April, three Avodah alumni from different cities, years, and programs joined a conversation with CEO Cheryl Cook about the challenges facing their respective professions at this moment in our country. Iris Bromberg (New York Justice Fellowship ’23-’24) is a Deputy Associate Director at the New Jersey Division on Civil Rights, Aaron Lawee (New York Service Corps ’05-’06) is an associate immigration attorney at Minsky, McCormick & Hallagan, P.C., and Rachel Sumekh (Chicago Service Corps ’12-’13) is an entrepreneur and strategy consultant who advises start-ups, nonprofits, and philanthropies.
All three panelists brought their unique perspective on the state of immigration justice (Aaron), discrimination law (Iris), and the role of Jewish social services nonprofits (Rachel) as our country continues to experience upheaval and uncertainty in justice work.
Though their Avodah experiences were vastly different, all panelists spoke clearly about the connection point between their time in Avodah and their work now. Aaron shared, “I don’t think I’d be doing this work if it weren’t for Avodah… it really helped me want to have a job that gave me purpose, it gave me exposure to so many amazing people who care about changing the world and want to fight to make the world a better place, and that hadn’t been where I was expecting to go.”
Aaron’s work as an immigration attorney also includes supervising young lawyers at Beyond Legal Aid, one of Avodah’s Service Corps placements in Chicago.
Rachel Sumekh spoke about how Avodah contributed to her own person growth, leading her to found the nonprofit organization Swipe Out Hunger: “I feel like my experience in Avodah taught me a lot about myself – I went from my very Iranian Jewish tribe to suddenly a brand new city with a lot of different people and it gave me the chance to figure out who I was being formed now by 15 very different unique folks. I walked away with a much stronger sense of self and self-identity.”
Though Iris participated in Avodah most recently, her experience in the Avodah Justice Fellowship while also being a practicing civil rights lawyer was a “reminder that when you build the foundations with people, how you can hear each other better and have difficult conversations. You might not agree, but you can hear each other. And that is so important to doing anything in the world, because we have to do it all together.” As she continues to work in the state legal system, her Avodah community has kept her nourished, centered, and motivated to lead in this work.
Some other meaningful moments in the panel include; Aaron’s reflection on the immigration system, which has never been a well operated process, and the new roadblocks that are appearing in immigrants’ paths to citizenship; Iris’s thoughts on what battles we pick and our own roles in fighting injustice; Rachel’s ideas on how we can better support Jewish professionals in Justice work, in both Jewish and secular organizations.
The program concluded with words from current Avodah Corps Member – Eve Chinea, whose Avodah placement this year is with CASA in DC. Her work can be extremely taxing, especially as CASA continues to step up in support of immigrants in the DC and Baltimore community – including the family of Kilmar Abrego García, who was wrongfully deported by the Trump administration to El Salvador.
Eve spoke to the power of her own Avodah community: “On a personal level, I come home and I know that we’re all doing such important work and we’re all committed and in the fight together, and that makes it possible to step back and do what we need to do to take care of ourselves and each other, to turn off for Shabbat and not talk about our work. [We get to] be in each other’s company, cook together, sing together, and do what we need to to stay in community and keep ourselves centered and focused on love, and building ourselves up in this time.”
We are so grateful to everyone who participated in, and attended the panel discussion. Watch the full video of the event here.
