Purim Party Among Jewish Federation of the North Shore’s

Array of Service

By Susie Davidson

Advocate Correspondent

WAKEFIELD - Felice Cohen, Director of Jewish Single Programs for the Jewish Federation of the North Shore, located at 21 Front St. Salem, has held many roles at the organization. A Peabody resident who grew up in Brighton, she has two daughters; Esther is a psychology major at Northeastern, Miriam is a high school senior. “I began volunteering for the Federation 15 years ago, as I felt it was serving a vital need for the area’s growing Jewish community,” she said. An educator, she felt she could contribute her outreach experience. Her grandfather was active in the Soviet Jewry immigration movement of the early 1900’s. Her parents were very involved in the CJP; her father was president of their synagogue, B’nai Moshe. “Three years ago, we realized that there was a need to bring Jewish singles together,” she recalled. The Federation’s Continuity Committee secured a grant from the Salem-based Robert I. Lappin Foundation, and since then, as director of the Federation’s singles division, she has helped plan various events including a once-a-month “dine-around” at North Shore restaurants, book club, and other social and cultural events.

This past Saturday, Cohen and Event Coordinator Diane Parker threw a Purim party at the Sheraton Colonial in Wakefield. Complete with raffles, a character artist, a fortune teller, Purim party items, Middle Eastern vegetarian platters, Purim cake and hamentaschen, the gala event drew 60 attendees; those bedecked in lavish attire included a 12-foot tall wizard, kings, queens, karate champ, jester, flapper, Tinkerbell, Mardi Gras attendants and varied colorfully-costumed others. Rabbi Ilana Rosansky of Salem’s Temple Shalom (dressed as Gypsy Rose Lee – “I dress the same way for the Megillah reading,” she said), spoke on the Salem-based Jewish Community Emergency Fund, which the event was collecting contributions for. “People on the North Shore are being downsized,” she said. “Two paychecks can sometimes mean the difference between housing and the streets.” Her 720 Club pinpointed 20 area families to assist; the Emergency Fund has raised thus far $48,000 for the Jewish Family Service, which is being dispersed at no administrative cost. “Today its somebody else, tomorrow it could be you or me,” she cautioned. “Now let’s go back to being silly.”

“I lived in Israel for seven years, and my daughter is there now,” she said later. “Obviously, I would love all the money to go to Israel, but we can’t ignore local needs.”

Parker, a Swampscott resident and Malden native, is the event planner for the singles division. A single mother, her 11 year old son, an avid Yu-gi-oh! fan, is on the town’s travel soccer team and attends Swampscott Middle School. They belong to Temple Emmanuel of Marblehead and also the Swampscott Chabad. Cohen called her in 2001, following a referral by the Marblehead JCC, and asked her to join the Steering Committee for the group.

The singles division is sponsoring a four-part spring series called “Feeling Good About Being Single”; on March 9 at the Naked Fish in Lynnfield, South Shore motivational speaker Jackie Grosser led a workshop on goalsetting. On April 9 at the Marblehead JCC, Community Road, Marblehead, facilitator Laura Zohman will hold a numerology workshop called “I’ve Got Your Number.” On May 14, also at the JCC, Ami White will lead a self-defense workshop entitled “Escape Unharmed,” and the last one, June 2, will feature Ellen Kaplan, who will moderate “the Dating Reality Show,” at the Sheraton Colonial in Wakefield.

There are 190 Federations throughout the country; the JFNS raises money for the needy in local communities, in Israel and throughout the world. Funds are allocated to Jewish Community Centers and varied institutions serving Jewish families. Their Continuity program holds a Shabbat program in peoples’ homes, leads education groups in North Shore synagogues which discuss Jewish holidays and traditions, and has a “Mitzvah Day” in the community (to be held April 5 throughout the area). Last year, 800 people participated in this multigenerational effort which, among other deeds, visited nursing homes with homemade cookies, cleaned up outdoor areas, painted local schools, volunteered at shelters and refurbished an AIDS facility in Gloucester.

“We‘re the same as the CJP, only based in the North Shore,” said Cohen and Parker. “We try to gear our activities according to need, and we keep things varied and even fun as we seek to advance Jewish continuity on the North Shore.”

For further information on the Federation, please visit www.jewishnorthshore.org