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Rabbi Aaron
Krupnick with
students from
Congregation Beth
El’s Early Childhood
Center SAFE, SECURE INDOOR/
OUTDOOR WALKING
PATHS NURSING SERVICES
ON-SITE Courtesy of
Congregation Beth El
aft er congregant.

Th e committee was sold.

Sirota said
Sussman brought the same warmth and
connection to KI. But she also
said that, with Sussman, that
wasn’t just about the culture he
established. Th e senior rabbi
increased KI’s educational
programming to give members
more opportunities to connect.

“People became more
relational to each other because
of the programs he helped to
create,” Sirota said.

Both Sussmans, Lance and
Liz, also helped families build
relationships over the course
of their life cycles. Liz Sussman
ran the Richard E. Rudolf Jr.

Preschool & Infant Center and
helped increase enrollment by
more than a third, according to
Lance Sussman.

A decade ago, Sussman also
started livestreaming services
to help people connect even
when they couldn’t be together
in person.

But his proudest accomplish-
ment may be the second-fl oor
space that reminds members why
it’s important to connect: Th e
Holocaust Awareness Museum
and Education Center. Sussman
dedicated the museum to his
grandparents, who escaped Nazi
Germany. Th eir picture hangs
near the entryway.

“I’ve done what I set out to
do,” Sussman said.

Krupnick was born and raised
in Philadelphia, but his fi rst
big rabbi post was at Agudath
Israel in Montgomery, Alabama,
where he served for six years. By
1994, though, Krupnick’s father
had terminal cancer, so the
rabbi started seeking a position
closer to home.

But he only found one
opening: At Beth El, which at
the time was in Cherry Hill,
New Jersey. So, Krupnick took
it. Th en, in 1995 at a Jewish
conference, another rabbi told
Krupnick that preschools were
the future of synagogues.

“Th at’s how you’ll get young
families,” the colleague told
Krupnick. Th e rabbi returned to South
Jersey, proposed the idea to his
board of trustees and started
building. In 1998, the school
opened. Two years later, Beth
El completed a new school
building in Voorhees with 21
classrooms. By 2010, the temple
was opening a sanctuary at the
same location and moving its
operation there.

Now, the Early Childhood
Center welcomes about 140
kids a year, and the synagogue
maintains one of the largest
congregations in the region.

Krupnick said Beth El was
one of the fi rst synagogues to
open a preschool. It was not a
common model before the ’90s.

“Th at was a need I understood
as a young parent,” he said.

Th e senior rabbi believes
digital operations will be the
next wave of the future. Beth El
is on social media and started
off ering online services during
the pandemic last year. But
Krupnick delegates many of
the digital responsibilities to
younger congregants.

“We’re going to need
younger people to lead that,”
he said. ●
jsaff ren@jewishexponent.com;
215-832-0740 Thursday, August 5, 2021
11 a.m. to 12:15 p.m.

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