Donna Klein Jewish Academy Board, Head of School Announce Rabbi Marshall Lesack As High School Principal - by Jane Neubauer Black

The Donna Klein Jewish Academy Board of Trustees and Head of School Helena Levine have
announced that, after a national search, Rabbi Marshall Lesack has been appointed principal of the Claire and Emanuel G. Rosenblatt High School at DKJA. Levine, the current head of school, held the position of principal of Rosenblatt High School for four years, until January 2015, when she became Head of School. Acting Principal Illana Joseph currently serves as the administrator at the high school (through June 2015) and will continue in that role until Lesack begins in July 2015.
     Lesack, an educator, consultant, administrator and community-minded leader, has nearly 20 years of experience working in Jewish education in a variety of settings: the classroom, summer camp, the synagogue and in the college environment.
     Lesack is a graduate of a pluralistic Jewish high school, Akiba Hebrew Academy (now the Jack M. Barrack Hebrew Academy) in Philadelphia, Pa. He earned his undergraduate degree from the honors program at Rutgers University with a Bachelor of Arts in history, received rabbinic ordination from The Jewish Theological Seminary of America and earned a Master of Arts in Jewish Education from the William Davidson Graduate School of Jewish Education. As part of his master’s degree program, he taught Rabbinics and Tanakh at a New York area high school. Lesack also lived in Israel for four years, during which time he studied at The Hebrew University of Jerusalem and the Schechter Institute of Jewish Studies, as well as at several yeshivas (educational institutions that focus on Jewish areas of study).
     Lesack currently serves as the Director of Education at Congregation Shearith Israel in Atlanta, Ga., where he built a new education program for the community. His leadership included the development of all new curriculum, training new faculty, leading a new education committee and increasing enrollment by almost 50 percent in just over a two-year period.
     Lesack is a faculty member of the pluralistic Lisa F. Brill Institute for Jewish Learning and The Florence Melton School of Adult Jewish Learning. He teaches courses and lectures regularly on Jewish texts and rituals, Jewish and Israeli history and the Arab-Israeli Conflict.
     Lesack also serves as an educational and organizational consultant and advisor to Jewish summer camps throughout North America, both independently and through the Foundation for Jewish Camp. His vast portfolio includes community outreach and camper recruitment; hiring, training and supervision of staff; and oversight of the camp’s many educational and programmatic areas and department heads, including the Judaic and Hebrew education departments.
     “I am really looking forward to joining DKJA at such an exciting time, and to working with the entire community, the parents, the faculty, and most importantly, the students,” said Lesack. “I am very familiar with the Boca Raton community, having served as the assistant director at Camp Ramah Darom, a large Jewish educational summer camp located in North Georgia, where many South Floridian youth spend their summers. My family and I are very excited to become a part of the DKJA community.”