After more than thirty years, finance and administration manager Sam Cardillo is saying farewell to the Katz Center.

David M. Goldenberg, the former President of the Dropsie College for Hebrew and Cognate Learning, the editor of the Jewish Quarterly Review, and the leading intellectual force who transformed the College into the Annenberg Research Institute, today known as the Herbert D. Katz Center for Advanced Judaic Studies at Penn, has donated his personal and administrative papers collection to the Library at the Katz Center.

It is with great sadness that we inform you of the death of Former Trustee Ione Apfelbaum Strauss, CW’54, PAR’82. Ione became a Penn leader at a crucial point in our University’s history, and her service helped open doors for the generations of volunteers that would one day follow. She will be deeply missed, and we offer our sincere condolences to her family and friends, especially her daughter Louise, C’82.

The Katz Center mourns the recent passing of Ione Apfelbaum Strauss (CW’54), who, in addition to her leadership as a university trustee, SAS overseer and president of Penn’s alumni association, was also instrumental in the creation of the Katz Center, as a supporter, advisor and as the chair of its board.  

The year 2020 has been a transformative one for American society, but what is America becoming? And what role do Jews play in the changes underway?

Even as the country struggles with a pandemic and massive unemployment, many Americans have at the same time been newly awakened to racial injustice and economic inequality. Much of the change now underway has been tragic; some of it is hopeful; and the combination may yet produce a very different America.

The Western Wall: The Dispute over Israel’s Holiest Jewish Site, 1967–2000
Brill
By Doron Bar (2007–08: Late Antiquity) and Kobi Cohen-Hattab

The 2019–2020 Katz Center fellows, in partnership with the Penn Libraries, have recently launched their fellowship year web exhibition entitled: "The Jewish Home: Dwelling on the Domestic, the Familial, and the Lived-In."

Earlier in July Philadelphia Eagles wide receiver DeSean Jackson unleashed a firestorm of controversy when he posted a quote falsely attributed to Hitler that claimed that Blacks, and not Jews, were the real children of Israel. 

Dear Katz Center community,

During the present public health challenge posed by the novel coronavirus (COVID-19), the Katz Center needs to follow guidelines established by the University of Pennsylvania. This includes cancelling all public programs for the remainder of the semester, as well as our annual Meyerhoff Lecture. We are hoping to reschedule many of these events for another time in the future, so please stay tuned.

It is my pleasure to announce the Katz Center fellowship cohort for the 2020–21 academic year, tackling the theme of “America's Jewish Questions.”