Robinson Will Engage and Support Jewish Leaders in Rural and Under-Resourced Communities Across the Country
The Center for Small Town Jewish Life at Colby College, an organization that cultivates locally rooted, vibrant, connected, socially equitable learning communities steeped in the Jewish tradition, has named Bill Robinson as Director of National Leadership Initiatives.
“As our organization continues to grow both in size and impact, we’re very excited to have Bill Robinson joining our team,” said Rabbi Rachel Isaacs, Executive Director of the Center for Small Town Jewish Life. “His expertise and vision will greatly help us reach more communities throughout the country and continue to support a diverse Jewish landscape. These communities are models for how people of different backgrounds and life perspectives can come together, build relationships, and learn from one another.”
In this new role, Robinson will serve a growing network of Jewish leaders from small, rural, and remote areas of the country through rigorous cohort learning programs, thoughtful in-person gatherings, and more. His work will help transform the trajectory of the Jewish communities where approximately 1 out of every 8 American Jews live.
“The Center for Small Town Jewish Life serves an extremely important mission by focusing on areas outside of major urban centers,” said Robinson. “Jewish life comes in all forms and sizes, and I look forward to helping more people connect to each other and to Jewish experiences that add meaning to their lives.”
More Info About Bill Robinson
Robinson is a recognized scholar-practitioner with over 30 years of experience building impactful nonprofit organizations and writing about the future of Jewish life and learning in America. He has studied and worked with scholars and practitioners across all denominations from Reform to Modern Orthodox. He has an interdisciplinary doctorate in the social sciences with a dissertation focused on rabbinic leadership.
Most recently, as the executive director of Na’aleh: The Hub for Leadership Learning in Baltimore, Robinson built the largest community-based Jewish leadership organization in North America and designed its distinctive training model, which focuses on seven core practices of Jewish leadership. A scholar of and longtime advocate for the transformation of Jewish education, Robinson has written numerous articles on new approaches to learning grounded in the creative work of cutting-edge practitioners. As the Dean of the Jewish Theological Seminary’s William Davidson Graduate School of Jewish Education and the Chief Strategy Officer of the Jewish Education Project, he also helped to make that transformation a reality.
About the Center for Small Town Jewish Life
The Center for Small Town Jewish Life at Colby College cultivates locally rooted, vibrant, connected, socially equitable learning communities steeped in the Jewish tradition and intertwined with the broader Jewish world. It envisions a diverse Jewish landscape that affirms the value of every individual and the power of mutually beneficial collaboration. The Center for Small Town Jewish Life brings this vision to life in Maine and empowers professional and lay leaders to realize it throughout the United States, especially in communities outside of major population centers.