Fast forward eight years, when Julia returned to Moscow to conduct research for her Harvard thesis on the transformation of psychiatry in post-Soviet Russia. The Jewish identity she now took for granted was questioned continuously. Julia realized how much she had changed. I now turned my shame into a strength, said Julia, who credits a large part of this transformation to the classes she took at the UJA Federation funded Bergen County High School of Jewish Studies. Here, she learned to read Hebrew, understand the narratives of Holocaust survivors, and grasp the religious significance of the Jewish holidays.
Federation is . . .
Again I was drowning financially and emotionally. In his late 50s, Irwin was laid off from his position as a top hospital administrator. To add to his woes, he was involved in a bad car accident, where he incurred head injuries. When he recovered, he was facing severe financial problems and was forced to take lower paying jobs. He turned to the JSN, which provided him with the individual attention, resume advice, and vocational counseling that he needed to gain meaningful employment.