Ophir Busel has found her place at United Jewish Federation of Princeton Mercer Bucks. Photo by Marilyn Silverstein
April 08, 2008
Ophir Lehavey Busel says her new role as director of marketing and communications for United Jewish Federation of Princeton Mercer Bucks is all about making connections.
“I have a real sense of purpose that I want to work with the Jewish community,” Busel said during a recent interview in her office in Lawrenceville. “I feel very strongly that our community and the Israeli community need to keep connected. I want to keep that connection strong, alive, and fruitful.”
At the PMB federation since early February, Busel is charged with a number of tasks, including revitalizing the federation’s Web site, managing the federation’s pages in New Jersey Jewish News, and finding venues to promote the federation and its overall mission.
“At the moment, I’m trying to get the Web site updated and trying to get the community involved so they know what we do and how we make a difference for this Jewish community and the Jewish community abroad,” she said.
“When all of that is taken care of, there’s a desire to really work with branding the federation as the hub of our community,” she said. “I’ll be doing research, planning, and working with people to put together a way to get our message across as clearly as possible.”
Most of all, she wants to promote awareness of Jewish values. “I have a very strong connection to my own Jewish identity and culture.”
Busel, 36, forged that connection as she was growing up in Margate, the daughter of Israeli parents, bilingual from the beginning. She attended the Hebrew Academy of Atlantic County and then the evening Hebrew high school run by the Jewish Federation of Atlantic and Cape May Counties. She was active as the social action and tikun olam chair of the Seashore United Synagogue Youth.
Then it was on to Georgetown University in Washington, where Busel earned a bachelor’s degree in history and art and spent her spare time as UJA chair of the Jewish student organization on campus. She later earned a master’s degree in Middle East studies from New York University.
Busel served as director of community relations at the Israeli consulate in New York before heading for Columbia University Teachers College, where she earned a master’s degree in education in 2000.
For the following two years, Busel put her degree to work as a social studies teacher at the Baruch College Campus High School in New York.
“Then I decided to follow my dream and move to Israel, and I lived there for three years, from 2002 to 2005,” she said. “I worked at a nonprofit, the Peres Center for Peace. The idea there was people-to-people projects, working with the Web to reach out to youth, Arab and Israeli.”
After that stint, she worked for Essence of Life, a nonprofit organization founded by Shari Arison, a businesswoman and heiress often referred to as Israel’s richest woman.
“The idea is that when you’re at peace with yourself, it radiates out and creates communities of peace,” Busel explained. “There again, it was working with the Web to reach out to youths and teens to teach them about peace.”
In 2005, Busel returned to the States and settled in Moorestown with her Israeli husband, Lior, a native of Arad who works for Verizon. Building on her experience in education and outreach, Busel took a position as communications manager for Foundations Inc., an educational nonprofit in Moorestown.
“But I really missed the Jewish community and I missed working with Jewish nonprofits,” she said, “and now I’m here.”
To all of these challenges, Busel brings her Web savvy, her expertise as an educator, her knowledge of Israel, and her experiences as a volunteer for Jewish causes.
“It’s completely gratifying and satisfying,” she said of her new role. “I feel like I’ve found my place.
“There are beautiful people working here — I mean beautiful on the inside,” she added. “There’s a real sense of mission and purpose, and of giving back to the community — a real sense that what we’re doing really makes a difference in people’s lives. I love it.”
- Comment: comments@njjewishnews.com