By , Special to JTNews
Long-time Seattle Jewish community leaders Albert and Jeanne Maimon will be honored with the Seattle Hebrew Academy’s Community Leadership Award on March 25 at the school’s annual dinner.
The event will be in the Spanish Ballroom of the Four Seasons Olympic Hotel in downtown Seattle. Cocktails will be served at 5 p.m. with dinner following at 5:30 p.m.
School parents Beth and Leon Rosenshein also are being honored at the dinner with the school’s annual Parent Volunteer Award. The Rosensheins, who moved to the Seattle area in 1999, have been heavily involved as volunteers with numerous SHA projects.
Recognition and honor also will be given to the work of Dale Chihuly, local glass artist, who recently put on the enormously successful and well-attended “In the Light of Jerusalem 2000” art show in Jerusalem.
Herb Weisbaum, consumer specialist for NBC’s “Today” show, will emcee the event.
The dinner is part of SHA’s current fund-raising drive to raise $250,000 to support existing and new general studies and Judaic programs.
Al and Jeanne Maimon have been extensively involved with SHA volunteer work as board members, committee chairs and school planners. Al has spent many years as an officer of the school, and has served as the school’s president. Jeanne has served as SHA’s PTA treasurer. But the Maimons’ community leadership track record doesn’t stop there.
Al has also served in integral roles in numerous other local Jewish organizations. He has served as a vice president of the Jewish Federation of Greater Seattle, as a long-time federation board member and as chairman of the federation’s Planning and Allocation committee. He was honored with the Spitzer Young Leadership Award.
Al also is known for his leadership and support of the Seattle Kollel and for his devotion to his synagogue, Sephardic Bikur Holim, and to such organizations as the Seattle Sephardic Brotherhood and the Jewish Education Council.
In similar fashion, Jeanne has worked in support of numerous other Jewish organizations, including as president of Amit Women and president of the Sephardic Bikur Holim Ladies Auxiliary.
Al was a member of the first graduating class of the Seattle Hebrew Day School.
In addition to serving as a fund-raising event, according to SHA Headmaster Rabbi Shmuel Kay, the dinner will be a celebration of several new innovations, including SHA’s newly established program that gives students a choice of Ashkenazic or Sephardic tefilah (prayer) in many grades. SHA is believed to be one of the only day-school programs in North America to offer both Sephardic and Ashkenazic education.
Another SHA program to be highlighted will be the school’s new in-house counseling department. The department, headed by Steve Deutsch, M.A., and Lori Landes, M.S.W., provides individual and group counseling whenever social, emotional or behavioral issues arise.