STAMFORD – Several leaders of the Connecticut Jewish community will be honored for their commitment to Jewish education and their dedication to community service at the Bi-Cultural Hebrew Academy Celebration Dinner, to be held Monday evening, May 30, 5:30 p.m. at the at the Al Fresco Pavilion at the Stamford Italian Center.  

“‘Something Special for Everyone,’ is the theme of this year’s Bi-Cultural Hebrew Academy Celebration Dinner, and our honorees represent this theme beautifully, bound together by their intelligence, accomplishment, commitment to Jewish education and love for BCHA,” said Rabbi Tzvi Bernstein, BCHA head of school.

The evening’s honorees are headed by Guests of Honor Gladys and Greg Teitel, who are recognized for their outstanding contribution to the school and their commitment to Stamford’s Jewish communal life.

The parents of four children, all of whom attended BCHA, the Teitels are an integral part of the Stamford Jewish community. A longtime member of the BCHA Board of Trustees, Greg has also served for six years as president of Young Israel of Stamford. 

Professionally, Greg Teitel is director of business development for SoMa Equity Partners, a San Francisco-based hedge fund. A graduate of the Charles E. Smith Jewish Day School in Rockville, Maryland, he holds a bachelors degree from Rutgers University and an MBA from the University of North Carolina.  

Gladys Teitel has served as a volunteer teaching Hebrew at various local institutions. She is also a Behrend Institute for Leadership Fellow and is active on the board of the Gabriel Project Mumbai (GPM), keeping strong connections with her maternal family roots in India’s Bene Israel Jewish community of Mumbai. A graduate of Brandeis University, Gladys holds a JD from Touro Law School.

In addition to the Teitels, other 2022 BCHA Celebration Dinner honorees include: 

Alumni Award recipient, Jake Sherman (’00), a nationally known journalist and author, and a veteran Washington, D.C. Capitol Hill reporter.  A former senior writer for Politico, last year Sherman co-founded Punchbowl News, a daily newsletter focusing on Congress. He is also a political contributor for NBC and MSNBC and worked previously in the Washington bureaus of the Wall Street Journal and Newsweek. 

A member of the Adas Israel D.C. Minyan and a supporter of numerous Jewish causes, Sherman and his wife, Irene, are the parents of three children. His parents, Bob and Stephanie Sherman, have deep roots in the Stamford community, and his brother Corey and sister Kate are also Bi-Cultural graduates.

BCHA Associate Head of School Rachel Haron is the recipient of this year’s Walter Shuchatowitz Award for Excellence in Education. Haron credits her parents, Linda and Larry Rezak, who are also active members of the Stamford Jewish community, with instilling in her a dedication to family, community and Jewish day school education. The parents of five children, all of whom attended BCHA, Haron and her husband, Dan, are both BCHA alum (’86)

This year’s BCHA Community Service Award is awarded to Six Thirteen Restaurant and its managers Glenn Karow and Adam Rafalowicz, who are recognized for the vital role the restaurant plays in the Stamford community, and the generosity of Karow and Rafalowicz to the school, the community, and the needy.

The dinner will also include a special tribute to the late Alan Kalter, a longtime friend of the school and the announcer on “Late Show With David Letterman,” who died in October 2021.

Proceeds from the dinner will benefit BCHA scholarships. For ticket information, contact (203) 329-2186.

Main Photo: Gladys & Greg Teitel, Bi-Cultural Hebrew Academy 2022 Celebration Dinner Guests of Honor.