Our Team
David Farbman, Project Director
David Farbman, Ph.D., has been the Project Director of the DEEP Consortium since 2021. As Director, David oversees all DEEP’s advocacy and quality improvement efforts, including the services provided to schools and DEEP’s publication, L’Hadlik. Prior to joining DEEP, he was the Director of Education at Gateways: Access to Jewish Education where he oversaw professional development and direct service programs. Before focusing on Jewish education, David worked for 15 years as Research Director and Senior Researcher at the National Center on Time & Learning, an organization advocating for and managing whole school change in underserved public schools. David holds a doctorate in American History from Brown University and a B.A. in history from Brandeis. He lives in the Boston area with his family.
Steering Committee
Rachel Mohl Abrahams
Senior Advisor for Education Grants and Programs, Mayberg Foundation
Rachel brings to her work as a grantmaker and change agent more than two decades of experience in Jewish educational project design, program management and evaluation. Previously Rachel served as a senior program officer at The AVI CHAI Foundation where she specialized in Jewish education grantmaking and day school initiatives. With a particular affinity for and expertise in personalized learning, Rachel has been a champion for integrating these methodologies into Jewish education spaces.
Rachel holds an M.A. in Bible from Bernard Revel Graduate School and a J.D. from the Cardozo School of Law, and she began her career as an attorney specializing in family law. She lives with her family in New York.
Rabbi Scot A. Berman
Director of English-Speaking Countries for UnitEd and initiative of the Ministry for Diaspora Affairs and Combating Antisemitism
Rabbi Berman has more than 40 years of experience in the fields of Jewish education and Jewish communal life. He has served in many educational capacities including elementary, secondary, university, and adult education. Rabbi Berman has served as head of school of a number of Jewish schools, founded two Jewish high schools, and was an executive director of a family philanthropic foundation.
Sharon Freundel
Managing Director, Jewish Education Innovation Challenge
Sharon attended Jewish day schools followed by studying at Stern College for Women of Yeshiva University and earning a Bachelor of Science in Nursing from the University of Maryland. She completed graduate courses at Teacher’s College of Columbia University and earned a Master of Arts in Jewish Education at the Baltimore Hebrew University.
Following several years of working in the nursing field, Ms. Freundel became engaged in the teaching of Torah. She taught and was the department chair for TaNaKH (Bible) and Torah SheBa’al Peh (Rabbinics) and was the mashgicha ruchanit (Spiritual Guidance Counselor) of the Upper School at the Melvin J. Berman Hebrew Academy. Most recently, she was the director of Jewish life at the Milton Gottesman Jewish Day School of the Nation’s Capital.
She teaches adult Jewish education classes throughout the Greater Washington, DC, area on topics such as TaNaKH, Jewish philosophy and contemporary halakhic issues in multiple venues and has lectured in Canada, Australia, Israel, and throughout the United States.
Arnee Winshall
As founding board president of Hebrew at the Center, Arnee Winshall was involved in the formation of DEEP (Developing Embedded Expertise Programs). Her involvement in Jewish day schools began as founding chair of JCDS, Boston’s Jewish Community Day School and chair of the RAVSAK board. She currently also serves on the board of Jewish Interactive, IEJI (Incubator for Emerging Jewish Initiatives) and on the advisory councils of the Mayberg Foundation JEIC and CAJM. She has served in leadership positions of numerous Jewish education organizations and as a Peace Corps volunteer in Thailand. Having pursued graduate studies in developmental psycholinguistics, Arnee is passionate about the power of language, in particular Hebrew, and its impact on identity and connection to Am Yisroel. She also believes that the key to strengthening the effectiveness of teaching and learning is an investment in high quality professional development.
