Our Professional Staff

Since April 2002, Rabbi Jen has blessed Kehillah with her spirituality, warmth, and passion for Jewish learning. She welcomes everyone, encouraging diversity in age, faith, and lifestyle. Her calming, centered approach makes our services, holiday programs, and life cycle events both vital and relevant.

Passionate about social justice and building interfaith understanding, Rabbi Jen helped to found the broad-based coalition Justice United of Orange County, co-led our Torah-Koran study group, and serves on the Rabbinic Advisory Board of Carolina Jews for Justice.

Rabbi Jen and her family love exploring local hiking trails and making jam with figs from their front yard trees.

Mary Lawrence brings more than 30 years’ experience in executive leadership, entrepreneurism and publishing to Kehillah. She has held CEO roles in different nonprofits, including Big Brothers Big Sisters, La Leche League International, and Cornucopia Cancer Support Center. Mary loves writing, gardening, reading historical novels, and most of all, spending time with her three children and six grandsons. One of her favorite sayings is “Don’t wait for people to be friendly; show them how.”

Stephanie joined Kehillah in 2008. She was often the first person to greet members and visitors. While she is now focused on the business side of operations, she still has time to greet everyone with a smile!
Prior to Kehillah she was a franchise business consultant with experience in financial management, marketing, and customer relations.
Stephanie lives in Durham with her family.

Sherri joined Kehillah as our Education Director in August 2013. Her approach to Jewish education is to cultivate Jewish identity and literacy through group inquiry, music, art, drama and movement. Students engage in active, experiential learning with practical application to their lives.
Sherri was a Fellow of the Mandel Teacher Educator Institute and the prestigious multi-year HUC/JTS Leadership Institute. Sherri holds a Masters Degree in Jewish Education from the William Davidson School of Education at Jewish Theological Seminary (2007). As a longtime resident of NJ, Sherri is happy to now call NC her home!

Krystal joined Kehillah in May 2018 as our Jewish Preschool Director. She has worked with young children and families for over 25 years, starting as an infant teacher and progressing to managing preschool centers and consulting within the childcare field. Her passion for young children is evident as soon as you meet Krystal. She has a BS in Early Childhood Education and a Master’s in Education Management.

Sherrie joined Kehillah in June 2018 when she moved from her native Texas. Sherrie worked at her synagogue in Texas in a variety of roles for over 10 years. She is also an accomplished musician and ran her own music business serving the senior living communities in Texas for over 30 years.
She is the first person to greet members and visitors when they visit Kehillah. She has three children and two beautiful grandchildren that she adores. She also loves the newest member of her family, a hamster named Pumpkin!

The Media and Marketing Coordinator is responsible for updating both the Kehillah Synagogue and Preschool websites, managing our social media accounts and online presence, and directing marketing campaigns for our programs.