Advisory Council on Jewish Inclusion Board Members
Dr. Carolin Aronis | She, Her, Hers
Dr. Carolin Aronis (she, her, היא) is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Ethnic Studies and an Affiliated Faculty in the Department of Communication Studies. She studies antisemitism, Jewish experiences, race, and gender through the intersection of critical media studies, rhetoric, and technologies, as well as the phenomenology of communication within challenging/impossible settings. Currently, she teaches a newly developed course, “Antisemitism Uncovered: From Rhetoric to Violence,” along with courses like “Introduction to Ethnic Studies” and “Ethnicity and the Media.” Since 2018 Dr. Aronis has been active in addressing the situation of the Jewish community on the CSU campus, and in the summer of 2020 was appointed the university Special Advisor on the Prevention of Antisemitism as well as the Co-Chair of the Presidential Task Force on Jewish Inclusion and the Prevention of Antisemitism. Currently, she serves as the Co-Chair of the Advisory Council on Jewish Inclusion under the Office of Inclusive Excellence. She also works with other universities and organizations in improving their own setting and becoming more Jewish-inclusive places. In Fall 2022, she was chosen to give a talk at the CSU INSPIRE event on the Inner Call to Caring and Acting upon Antisemitism. See more about her work and background here.
Dr. Renee Cohn Jones | She, Her, Hers
Renee has been involved with the Jewish Community in Northern Colorado since 2004. As a mother of two, she was a Hadassah Al Galgalim leader for over 4 years and also introduced and coordinated the PJ Library program in Northern Colorado during and after that. She served as the Temple Or Hadash Religious School Director, the Preschool Program and the B’nai Mitzvah Coordinator for over 15 years.
In her role as a B’Nai Mitzvah tutor for the Or Hadash, Har Shalom, and Chabad communities, she has often been called on to be an advocate for Jewish students within the Poudre, Thomson, Windsor, and Severance School Districts. She has been invited to speak to administration, staff, and students and works with many departments within the City of Fort Collins and Larimer County to promote Jewish Inclusion and the prevention of antisemitism.
Representing the Fort Collins community, she was one of the original members to serve on the CSU Presidential Task Force for Jewish Inclusion and the Prevention of Antisemitism.
Brenda Epstein | She, Her, Hers
Brenda Epstein serves as the Employer Relations Coordinator in the Career Center under the Division of Student Affairs at Colorado State University. She works specifically with Agricultural and Natural Resources employers on recruiting, hiring, and internships for CSU students. Shortly after getting her master’s degree in accounting, Brenda worked for eight years on the business side of Agriculture companies. She worked primarily in Accounting, Human Resources, and overseeing business practices. Brenda is currently studying for a Project Management Professional certification. Within the Career Center Brenda works on the Employer Diversity Equity and Inclusion Committee and well as the Funding Committee. Both are heavily rooted in promoting equity for marginalized populations. Brenda is a member of Har Shalom Synagogue in Fort Collins, Colorado. Currently, Brenda serves as the Secretary for the Advisory Council for Jewish Inclusion at Colorado State University.
Adam Fox | He, Him, His
Adam Fox (he/him) is the Director of CSU Hillel. A graduate of Northern Arizona University, Adam has extensive experience working and volunteering for numerous Jewish nonprofits, including the University of Arizona Hillel Foundation, University of Iowa Hillel, Chabad of Flagstaff, Tucson Jewish Community Center, and the Shaw Jewish Community Center of Akron.
As the CSU Hillel Director, Adam’s responsibilities include overseeing daily and weekly programming, provides leadership opportunities to students, recruits students for twice-yearly trips to Israel, develops strategies for student retention and engagement, builds relationship with the greater CSU and Fort Collins Jewish and non-Jewish communities, and maintains the daily operations of the Hillel House.
Mica Glantz | She, Her, Hers
Dr. Mica Glantz (she/her) received her B.A. and Ph.D. in Anthropology from the University of Pennsylvania. She is a paleoanthropologist who specializes in Neandertal paleobiology and paleogeography. Broadly, her research focuses on hominin dental and craniofacial morphology as well as Paleolithic archaeology in Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan in order to better understand Neandertal/modern human/Denisovan interactions during the late Pleistocene of Central Asia. She was a Fulbright Scholar from 2007-08 in Shymkent, Kazakhstan. Currently, she is collaborating on a multi-disciplinary project on Central Asian Paleolithic sites. Dr. Glantz identifies as a secular Jewish person. She grew up going to Jewish summer camp and eating bagels and lox Sunday morning with her family. She worked for six summers at the Neandertal cave site of Hayonim, located in the Upper Galilee in Israel and collected her dissertation data from Tel Aviv University. She is committed to creating a more inclusive environment for Jewish students and culture on CSU’s campus. Dr. Mica Glantz can be reached at Mica.Glantz@colostate.edu. Learn about her scholarly work here.
Rabbi Yerachmiel Gorelik | He, Him, His
Rabbi Yerachmiel Gorelik (he/him), lectures in the Department of Philosophy on topics related to traditional Judaism (Phil 173 Philosophy of Judaism) and is considered one of the foremost authorities on Jewish topics in Northern Colorado. A popular Jewish educator in the community and on campus and a recipient of the “CSU Best Teacher Award”, Rabbi Gorelik is known for his humor, passion, funny accent and unique ability to relate to audiences of all backgrounds.
Gorelik serves as faculty advisor for the Chabad Jewish Student Association, AEPi Jewish fraternity, SAEPi Jewish sorority and Students for Holocaust Awareness Week, and is the Rabbi and executive director of the Chabad Jewish Center of Northern Colorado.
Gorelik is also an army chaplain (CPT) in the Colorado National Guard serving soldiers throughout the state.
Lucas Miller | He, Him, His
Lucas Miller serves as the Senior Associate Director for Residential Dining Services within Housing and Dining Services at Colorado State University. He directly oversees dining centers that serve over two million meals per year to the 6,000+ residential students on campus. Lucas guided the opening of the Kosher Bistro, CSU and Northern Colorado’s first and only kosher dining facility. While earning degrees at Purdue University and The Culinary Institute of America, he traveled extensively oversees working in hotels and restaurants to broaden his experiences living and working amongst different cultures. Using those experiences and others gained by working in the diverse hospitality industry, and as a member of the LGBTQ+ community, have allowed him to value and promote diverse working and living environments. He looks forward to working in the Advisory Council to elevate Jewish voices, identity, and access within the CSU community.
H.J. Seigel | He Him, His
H.J. Siegel is a Professor Emeritus at Colorado State University (CSU). From 2001 to 2017, he was the George T. Abell Endowed Chair Distinguished Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering at CSU, where he was also a Professor of Computer Science. From 2002 to 2013, HJ served as the first Director of the CSU Information Science and Technology Center (ISTeC), a university-wide organization for enhancing CSU’s activities pertaining to the design and innovative application of computer, communication, and information systems. HJ was a professor at Purdue University from 1976 to 2001. He received two B.S. degrees from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), and the M.A., M.S.E., and Ph.D. degrees from Princeton University. HJ grew up in the lower east side of New York City (Manhattan), where he was Bar Mitzvah. HJ and family moved to the Fort Collins area in 2001. HJ has served on the Board of Directors of Congregation Har Shalom synagogue in Fort Collins for five years, including as the President.
Rye Vigil | He, Him, They
Rye Vigil (he/them) serves as an Assistant Vice President for Inclusive Excellence at Colorado State University. They are a two-time CSU alumna with a B.A. in Ethnic Studies and Women’s Studies and an M.S. in Student Affairs and Higher Education. Ria brings humor, compassion, and deep expertise to their work. Rye is a highly regarded trainer who has worked with many CSU and community partners. He has created a diversity certificate program for both faculty and staff at CSU and trained over 8,000 CSU employees over the last nine years in Diversity and Inclusion practices and Inclusive Pedagogy. In addition to training on campus, Rye serves as a strategic thought leader and consultant to institutional departments in the ongoing process of infusing social justice, diversity, equity, and inclusion into the culture of CSU. Rye is currently pursuing a Ph.D. in the Higher Education Leadership Program at CSU through the School of Education at CSU.
Deborah Yalen | She, Her, Hers
Deborah Yalen is an Associate Professor in the Department of History at Colorado State University. She regularly teaches the history of Imperial Russia and the Soviet Union, as well as the Holocaust in Historical Perspective and a transnational course in Modern Jewish History. Her scholarship explores the Jewish experience in the Soviet Union in the 1920s and 1930s, and she draws extensively on sources in Yiddish. Over the years, she has conducted research in archives in Russia, Ukraine, and Belarus, and her work has been supported by the National Endowment for the Humanities. She is currently completing a co-authored volume on the history of Jews in the Soviet Union in the 1930s for a multi-volume research project sponsored by New York University’s Global Network for Advanced Research in Jewish Studies. She serves on the education committee of the Advisory Council for Jewish Inclusion.
Josh Zaffros | He, Him, His
Josh handles communications, media, student and community outreach, and events for the Department of Anthropology and Geography at Colorado State University. He is also an instructor who teaches courses in science journalism, news writing, and environmental communications, and he developed the Graduate Certificate in Communications for Conservation at CSU. His writing and journalism have appeared in High Country News, Audubon, Yale Environment 360, and many other print and digital media.