Rabbi Ed Elkin (President)
Rabbi Ed Elkin has served as the spiritual leader of the First Narayever Congregation since 2000. Hailing from Long Island, NY, Rabbi Elkin received his undergraduate degree from Princeton University, and was ordained from the Hebrew Union College in New York in 1990.
His special interests in the rabbinate include Bible commentaries, and the relationship between religion and state in the contemporary world.
He served as a rabbi and teacher in Montreal for several years, and as Hillel Director in Chapel Hill, NC, before moving to Toronto.
Rabbi Elkin is married to Linda Lipsky, a Montrealer who teaches literature.
Rabbi Jennifer Gorman (Vice President)
Rabbi Jennifer Gorman is the National Director of Outreach & Programming for CJPAC. A past president of the Ontario Region of the Rabbinical Assembly, during which time she also sat on the Executive Committee of the International Rabbinical Assembly, Rabbi Gorman continues to serve on multiple Rabbinical Assembly committees.
Rabbi Gorman is a graduate of Brandeis University and The Jewish Theological Seminary. She brings a widely varying background to her rabbinate, having worked in communities in the United States and Canada and in multiple areas of the rabbinate – from formal and informal education to pulpit and organizational work.
She is married to Rabbi Sean Gorman with whom she raised three children and many cats.
Rabbi Julia Appel (Secretary)
Rabbi Julia Appel is the Director of Innovation Training for Clal: The National Jewish Center for Learning and Leadership. Previously, she served as the Senior Jewish Educator and Campus Rabbi at Hillel at the University of Toronto since 2016. In that role, she led the team through a multi-year redesign of what Hillel is on campus, in partnership with the Organizational Design Lab of Hillel International.
Rabbi Appel has trained in relational engagement pedagogy as a fellow with M2’s pilot Relational Engagement Circle and in diversity and inclusion with trainer Yavilah McCoy.
Rabbi Appel previously served as Jewish Educator at M.I.T. and Amherst College Hillels, as assistant rabbi at Temple Emanu-El-Beth Sholom and Congregation Dorshei Emet in Montreal, and as director of family programming at Makom in Toronto.
She earned and M.A. in Jewish Studies and rabbinic ordination from the Rabbinical School of Hebrew College in 2011 and holds a B.A. in Social Studies, Magna Cum Laude, from Harvard University.
A native of Boston, Rabbi Appel lives in downtown Toronto with her family.
Rabbi Jarrod Grover (Recording Secretary)
Rabbi Jarrod Grover serves as the senior spiritual leader and mara d’atra of Beth Tikvah Synagogue in Toronto. He came to Beth Tikvah as an assistant rabbi at 28 years old and, upon appointment, became the youngest Senior Rabbi of any large congregation in North America. A bilingual native of Montreal, Rabbi Grover received his bachelor’s degree in Economics at Princeton University. His M.A. and rabbinic ordination are from the Jewish Theological Seminary of America where he served as president of the students’ organization.
Rabbi Grover is a leading religious voice within the Canadian Jewish Community. He currently serves as President of the Ontario Region of the Rabbinical Assembly, and sits on the Executive Council of the Rabbinical Assembly.
He is a Rabbinic Cabinet member of Israel Bonds and the Jewish Federations of North America. He has received numerous fellowships and awards, including several leadership awards from the Government of Canada, and accreditation by the Canadian Association for Pastoral Practice and Education. In the winter of 2014, he was invited by the Prime Minister to join him on his official delegation to Israel.
He is married to Carmela, with whom he shares three children and a Boston Terrier named Kobi.
Rabbi Cory Weiss (Treasurer)
Rabbi Cory Weiss began his tenure as the Rabbi of Temple Har Zion in Thornhill, Ontario in July, 2006. He is a member of the Toronto Board of Rabbis, the Reform Rabbis of Greater Toronto, and is past president of the Greater Toronto Interfaith Clergy Curling Club. Rabbi Weiss was recently sworn in as a York Regional Police Chaplain.
Rabbi Weiss received his rabbinical ordination at the New York campus of the Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion in 1993. He received his Bachelor of Music degree in 1986 from the University of Michigan, where he studied French horn, composition, and Judaic Studies.
Rabbi Weiss is a composer, who has written compositions for synagogues throughout North America, and has a number of pieces published by Transcontinental Music. In 2013, he was commissioned to write a setting of Psalm 100 for the Curling Club’s Interfaith Choir Concert.
Rabbi Weiss has served on the Board of the Central Conference of American Rabbis, and on the editorial board of the Reform Movement’s prayerbook for youth and families, Mishkan T’filah L’No’ar.
Rabbi Weiss is currently working toward a Doctor of Hebrew Letters degree, with a focus on Aramaic Additions to the biblical Book of Esther.
Rabbi Weiss lives in Thornhill with his wife Karen, who is a professional Jewish Educator. He is very proud of their two sons, Michael, a rabbi, and Jacob, a professional musician.
Rabbi Aaron Levy (Member-at-Large)
Rabbi Aaron Levy is a leader in the revival of downtown Jewish life in Toronto, where he is the founding rabbi and executive director of Makom.
Rabbi Levy fuses Jewish tradition and progressive values in his teaching and life. As the descendant of both Sephardic (Judeo-Spanish, by way of the Island of Rhodes) and Ashkenazic (Polish & Russian) immigrants to Turtle Island (North America), he personally embodies Jewish multiculturalism.
Rabbi Levy previously served as Madrikh Ruhani/Spiritual Leader of Associated Hebrew Schools, was the founding rabbi of Annex Shul, served as campus rabbi at three Hillels, and led wilderness backpacking trips. He currently sits on the Downtown Jewish Community Council and the Rabbinic Advisory Board of Eshel, promoting LGBTQ inclusion in Orthodox and traditional Jewish communities.
Originally from Rockville, Maryland, he received BAs from Columbia University and the Jewish Theological Seminary and was ordained in 2004 in the first graduating class of Yeshivat Chovevei Torah – The Open Orthodox Rabbinical School in New York City.
Rabbi Yael Splansky (Immediate Past President)
Rabbi Yael Splansky is the Senior Rabbi of Holy Blossom Temple. She came to Toronto in 1998 after ordination from Hebrew Union College – Jewish Institute of Religion in Cincinnati, Ohio. She served first as Assistant Rabbi, concentrating on youth and young families from 1998-2000, then as Associate Rabbi from 2000-2013.
From the Boston area, Rabbi Splansky completed her undergraduate studies in Anthropology and Jewish Studies at Indiana University in Bloomington and at Hebrew University in Jerusalem. Her rabbinical thesis is entitled, “All is Forseen and Freewill is Given: A Debate in Rabbinic Literature.”
She is the immediate past chair of the Reform Rabbis of Greater Toronto. She is the editor of the new prayerbook, Siddur Pirchei Kodesh, author of the Union for Reform Judaism’s “Reform Voices of Torah: 2012 Commentary on Deuteronomy,” and monthly contributor to The Canadian Jewish News.
Her husband, Professor Adam Sol, is an award-winning poet and together they raise their three sons.
Rabbi Splansky has the unique privilege of being a fourth-generation Reform Rabbi.