Abstract
The creation of the HBI began more than two decades ago, when Professor Shulamit Reinharz was asked to head a National Commission on Jewish Women (1993), created by Hadassah, the Women's Zionist Organization of America, Inc. Working to fulfill the mandate of the National Commission-to gather information on the lives of contemporary American Jewish women-Brandeis's Dr. Amy Sales gathered together all the existing research on American Jewish women that she could find, and Hadassah sent me on a research trip across the United States from Georgia to Oregon, conducting focus group discussions and interviews with Jewish women of diverse ages, diverse marital status and diverse religious orientations. The Hadassah-Brandeis Institute came into being in 1997 (enjoying several variant names in its early years) after Hadassah leaders invited Shula to become the Founding Director and creator of a brand new entity, which would combine Brandeis University's historical commitments to penetrating and wide-ranging research, to social justice and to serving the Jewish community, with Hadassah's historical dedication to bettering the international Jewish world and to Jewish education. Shula worked with the HBI Board to establish competitive research awards that support Jewish feminist academic scholarship at colleges and universities around the world.