Board of Advisors
| Eva Brettler, Co-President | |
| Michele Rodri, Co-President | |
| Rochel Blachman, Treasurer | |
| Helen Jacobs-Lepor, Secretary | |
| Eva Suissa, Teen Board President | |
| Sara Aftergood | |
| Michael Berenbaum, Ph.D. | |
| Rabbi Sarah Bassin | |
| Rabbi Sharon Brous | |
| Lidia Budgor | |
| Sophie Dornstreich | |
| Cece Feiler | |
| Lya Frank | |
| Edith Frankie | |
| Natalie Gold | |
| Armin Goldstein | |
| Rabbi Judy Greenfeld | |
| Sharon Haims | |
| Marie Kaufman | |
| David Lenga | |
| Debra Levine | |
| Serena Levy | |
| Rabbi Stan Levy | |
| Rabbi Ron Li-Paz | |
| Sarah Moskovitz | |
| Molly Schaffer | |
| Mariel Seta | |
| Sheryl Sokoloff | |
| Rabbi Boruch Sufrin | |
| Dr. Steven Teitelbaum | |
| Ashley Waterman | |
| Rabbi David Wolpe | |
| Amy Ziering | |
| Harry Zimmerman | |
| Gesher Calmenson, Founder |
Staff
Samara Hutman, Director
Leslie Heinz, Fulfillment and Design
Sophie Dornstreich, Director of Outreach
Natan Freller, Outreach, South America
Biographies
Gesher Calmenson, Founder. Gesher retired in 1995 from a 30–year career in publishing to work in Jewish education. In 2003 he founded Remember Us. He is the Education Director Emeritus of Dor Hadash Religious School, Congregation Ner Shalom, Cotati, California, and a Jewish Family Education Fellow (1999–2002). Gesher served as Chairman of the Regional Educators Council, Bureau of Jewish Education, San Francisco (2001–2002), and was a leader in Jewish Family Room, a multi–generational home–based family education program (2002–2005). He served as a school assessment specialist of NESS, a program to encourage excellence in synagogue schools. In his home community he serves as the chairman of the Sonoma County Yom Hashoah Commemoration Committee, mentors bar/bat mitzvah students, and tutors special needs and gifted students in Jewish studies. He currently serves on the Board of Directors of Upstart Bay Area, an incubator and training center for Jewish innovation. Gesher writes,
"We are at a unique point historically and culturally. Our most important work is preparing our young people to be the active stewards of an emerging Jewish future which none of us can yet see. Our success in this enterprise depends on teaching our young people to embrace, be motivated by, and relate passionately to our history."This is the ongoing work of Remember Us.
Samara Hutman, Director.
Samara Hutman has recently taken on the role of Director of Remember Us. Hutman has steered the organization on a path of expansion and outreach, building the foundation for partnerships with educational and artistic institutions throughout the city.
Hutman first joined Remember Us as a volunteer in 2007 after her daughter, Rebecca, participated in The Holocaust Bnai Mitzvah Project. “Our family was deeply moved by the experience,” said Hutman, who served Remember Us as board president for three years. “It was a simple yet powerful act of remembrance for a child we never knew but whose memory became a part of our family story. And in the name of Victoria Farhi and her family, we were moved to act for good and righteousness. To quote Rabbi Irving ‘Yitz’ Greenberg, ‘It is thus that we turn cruelty and oppression into a source of energy... we show that love and memory can overcome hatred and evil, amnesia and apathy’.”
Hutman is a graduate of Barnard College, Columbia University, and studied at New York University’s film program.