Nina Friedman: Bringing in New Generations

Thursday, Oct 29 2020

Nina Friedman, Outreach and Engagement VP for Hadassah Chicago North Shore

Energetic and committed, Nina Friedman folds her passion for Hadassah into a firm belief that education and engagement with Hadassah can be fun. This approach has guided her successful efforts as Outreach and Engagement VP for Hadassah Chicago North Shore. At 46, Nina has helped attract like-minded women to Hadassah by honoring the past while introducing fresh ideas.

Sometimes, that means social events, like a distillery tour, to bring new members and donors into the Hadassah fold. At the same time, she’s significantly boosted long-term engagement as a liaison with Momentum, a partnership she describes as a “perfect marriage” through which Hadassah brings women, with children under age 18, to Israel. Once back, each cohort shares a yearlong learning experience. 

Friedman says, “The hope is women will see that it’s not just your grandmother’s Hadassah.” 

As a fourth-generation Hadassah member, Friedman should know. “I can’t remember not knowing about Hadassah,” she says. Her maternal grandmother, Annette Goldberg Sohn Hirsch, began the family’s lifelong connection to and passion for Hadassah. 

“My mother, Hindea Sohn Markowicz,” says Friedman, “was president of Hadassah Toledo for many years. For 24 years, she ran Check It Out, Hadassah’s breast cancer awareness program for area schools, winning the Hadassah National Education Award.” 

Her paternal grandparents, Ruth and Philip Markowicz, met at a displaced person’s camp in Germany after surviving the Holocaust. Ruth was active in the Zionist youth movement and the couple hoped to immigrate to Israel, but family sponsorship led them to Toledo with their son Allen, Nina’s father. Ruth joined Hadassah and later the couple created a Young Judaea Scholarship. 

Friedman graduated from The Ohio State University, including spending a semester at Tel Aviv University, before earning a master’s degree in social work at Washington University. However, it wasn’t until she moved to Chicago, as an adult, that she got involved on her own terms with Hadassah. Today, she works as Director of Post-Adoption Support at The Cradle in Evanston, IL. “I moved to Chicago without a job,” she says, “so I volunteered at the Hadassah office.” 

It was there she met women who raved about what they’d learned from her grandmother, Annette, who had many leadership roles in her lifelong association with Hadassah Chicago. Nina became immersed in local Hadassah programs, taking on leadership roles, organizing silent auctions for fundraising galas and went to Israel as part of

Today, her family is involved in Hadassah too. Her husband, Mitchell, and their two sons — Micah, 14, and Aiton, 12 — are all Hadassah Associates. 

As Chicago’s Outreach and Engagement VP, she’s excited to do what she can at the local level to help build EVOLVE Hadassah, a national initiative to attract and engage women under 50. “COVID-19 changed everything,” says Friedman, “our first virtual event was a Pilates class with a great turnout!” 

Like many Hadassah leaders, Friedman’s community leadership extends beyond Hadassah. She volunteers with her synagogue’s Women’s League, Cub Scouts, PTA, and Wilmette Baseball Association. Why does she keep doing for others? “My upbringing was about Jewish values — love for family and Israel, tikkun olam, and knowing who we are, proud Jewish people who have overcome so much and give so much to society.” 

Friedman finds her volunteer work fulfilling and imagines herself finding creative new strategies to attract and engage women in Hadassah’s work for many years to come.

As featured in the 2019 Hadassah Annual Report, released in July 2020

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