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Sasha Rogelberg | Staff Writer
F ormer Gratz College board
member Daniel Cohen was a
student at Gratz from age 5
until 93, about a year before his death
in April 2022. He had served on the
board since 1957.

“I have been almost everything at
Gratz, from elementary school student
to chairman of the board, and from
teacher to carpool driver to parent,”
Cohen said in a September 2020 oral
history of Gratz.

Cohen’s passion for adult education,
shared by his wife Louise, lives on in
the form of a trust that still supports the
college. But now the couple’s legacy
will be cemented in Gratz’s Adult
Jewish Learning program.

Cohen’s four children finalized a
$150,000 gift to the college on May
22, matched by an anonymous donor,
intended to expand Gratz’s adult
education program.

The newly named Daniel and Louise
Cohen Adult Jewish Learning Program
will continue to grow Gratz’s noncredit
courses, continuing legal education
courses, endowed speaker series and
in-person Gratz Cafe programs. The
donation allowed Gratz to hire Rabbi
Daniel Levitt, former executive direc-
tor at Hillel of Temple University, to
become the program’s director.

The adult learning program's expan-
sion follows “the proposition that Torah
lishmah, Torah for its own sake, must
be a good thing,” Gratz President Zev
Eleff said. “We’re leaning into our role
as a cultivator and incubator of Torah
conversations.” Gratz College in Melrose Park offers
year-round courses covering the
Holocaust, Israel and Jewish history,
such as “Soviet and Post-Soviet Jewry:
175 Personal Journeys” as part of its
adult education programming, which
primarily serves retired and semi-re-
tired adults in the Philadelphia area.

6 JUNE 1, 2023 | JEWISH EXPONENT
The Cohen family and Gratz College staff at a gathering at Gratz on May 22
Upon joining Gratz’s administra-
tion on June 1, Levitt will embark on
a listening tour of the Philadelphia
Jewish community to decide the direc-
tion of future courses and programs.

“I’m interested in hearing about what
people’s Jewish journeys have been
throughout their lives,” Levitt said. “At
this stage in their lives, if they want to
engage in further deeper Jewish learn-
ing — and, in my experience, so many
people do — what might that look like
for them?”
Levitt envisions the future of Gratz’s
adult learning to follow the beit midrash
model — a study space and community
common in Orthodox spaces, but less
so in other denominations. His goal
is to cultivate a culture of community
learning without reinventing Gratz’s
structure and curriculum.

“Right now, it’s important to not lose
sight that Gratz is already running
quality adult education programs,”
Levitt said. “And I want to maintain that
quality while expanding the number of
people engaging with them.”
Levitt will work alongside immediate
past chair of Gratz’ executive board,
chair of the communal education
committee and professor of Jewish
history Rabbi Lance Sussman.

Gratz primarily serves as a gradu-
ate school in Jewish fields, and the
college hired antisemitism scholar Ayal
Feinberg as director of the corner-
stone Center for Holocaust Studies and
Human Rights. But the adult education
program is a way for Gratz to connect
with a broader demographic, accord-
ing to Sussman.

“I like to call it the face of Gratz
College to the community,” he said. “It’s
the place where the general commu-
nity, Jewish community connects to
Gratz College.”
Since the pandemic, Gratz’s course
attendance has increased each year,
from 120 in 2021 to 160 in 2022.

According to Eleff, more than 200
people are enrolled in summer courses.

About 1,000 people attend each online
speaking event.

Gratz had a strong online presence
long before COVID back in the inter-
net’s early days, and the college has
attracted a pluralistic Jewish audience
through its online offerings.

Founded in 1895, Gratz College was
originally part of Mikveh Israel, created
by the synagogue’s treasurer at the
time, Hyman Gratz. Today, Mikveh
Israel remains a trustee of Gratz
College. Daniel Cohen was a lifelong member
of Mikveh Israel and served on the
synagogue’s board and as president.

While Cohen’s family was not Sefardic
and hailed from Ukraine, Cohen and
his brother became b’nai mitzvah at
the synagogue. His parents met at
the congregational Hebrew school
at Gratz, then part of Mikveh Israel,
and Cohen began his religious school
education at age 5.

“He was a deep lover of Judaism and
a lover of learning, really intellectually
curious about all kinds of things,” son
Jonathan Cohen said.

Cohen’s wife was equally committed
to Jewish education. She was president
of Mikveh Israel’s Women’s Association
and a docent at the synagogue and
was involved at the Hebrew Sunday
School Society of Philadelphia, now
the Hebrew Benevolent Society.

“She started studying at Gratz, too,”
Jonathan Cohen said. “I remember her
taking, in particular, Hebrew language
that she would practice with us at
home.” Though the Cohens were involved
in numerous Jewish organizations,
their children believed that the
couple’s devotion to Jewish education
should reflect where their names are
preserved. “We really have deep Gratz roots,”
Jonathan Cohen said. ■
srogelberg@midatlanticmedia.com Courtesy of Gratz College
Gratz College to Expand Adult Education
with 300K Donation