Jews in the US, Israel and around the world, as well as Jewish organizations, have like everyone else had to confront the changes and difficulties brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic.
This has made the role of Jewish philanthropy ever more critical during these times, as nonprofits conducting vital social and communal functions have come under increasing financial pressure.
One individual at the heart of fundraising within the Jewish community is Felicia Herman, whose roles at the Natan Fund and the Aligned Grant Program of the Jewish Community Response and Impact Fund have placed her front and center of the efforts to help those in the community affected by the pandemic.
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After working as the Natan Fund’s executive director for 16 years, Herman this year became president of the organization, through which philanthropists pool their charitable resources and pick Jewish and Israeli start-up and post-start-up nonprofits, social businesses and social entrepreneurs around the world to support.
Despite the pandemic, the fund has continued to lend its support to a wide range of innovative organizations designed to tackle the problems facing Jews and Jewish communities around the globe, and ensure their operations can continue.
Under Herman’s leadership, Natan has funded organizations such as the Zioness Movement in the US, which advocates for a strong Zionist identity while engaging in civil rights activism; Eshkolot, which provides ultra-Orthodox youth with formal and informal education opportunities; and the Jewish Fertility Foundation, which provides financial assistance to Jews with medical fertility challenges.
And Herman has also served as director of the Aligned Grant Program of the Jewish Community Response and Impact Fund, an organization formed by seven foundations, working together with the Jewish Federations, to provide emergency and strategic support for US-based Jewish nonprofit organizations involved in Jewish education, engagement and leadership.
In 2020, JCRIF amassed a fund of $91 million for grants and no-interest loans to preserve Jewish institutions and the functions of Jewish communities during the pandemic.
It has provided funds to Prizmah, the national network of Jewish day schools, for tuition assistance for families facing financial challenges, and gave emergency funding for Jewish camps through grants and no-interest loans which suffered badly due to the financial difficulties wrought by the global health crisis.
Along with her other roles, Herman is also managing editor of Sapir, a new journal of Jewish ideas being launched in spring 2021; president of the board of the American Jewish Historical Society; and serves on the boards of Sefaria and the DreamStreet Theatre Company, a performing arts company for adults with developmental disabilities.
In an article in Tablet Magazine in March 2020 at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, Herman pointed out that the entire array of Jewish communal, educational and social institutions faced obliteration as large numbers of people working in them faced layoffs or furloughs, and that “the warp and weft” of daily Jewish life was at risk.
Herman, through her leadership and innovation, has been an important part of the philanthropic map helping ensure that the fabric of Jewish life in the US has not been torn asunder by the global heath crisis.