Teachers

Mark Price

1st Grade

Mark was born in New York City and lived for 17 years in Stamford, Connecticut. He graduated from Haverford College with a double degree in English and Spanish, and then earned his MBA from the University of Virginia’s Darden School.

When not working as Chief Data Officer for CaringBridge, a consulting firm, Mark is an adjunct professor at the University of St. Thomas. He is an avid Crossfitter, plays and follows tennis, is passionate about Liverpool in the English Premier League and obsesses about Really Big Dogs (RBD’s) . He is also a storyteller and brings that skill to frequent use in the classroom.

Mark has been teaching religious school at Bet Shalom for the past 20 years. He has been trained in Responsive Classroom, All Kinds of Minds, and Teach Like a Champion approaches.

Stacey Edlavitch

1st Grade

Stacey is very excited to teach 1st grade again at Bet Shalom. She has a Bachelor of Science in Special Education from the University of Wisconsin in Madison, and a Master of Education in Special Education from the University of Illinois at Chicago. Stacey has been a Special Education teacher for the past 20 years. She currently teaches at Minnetonka High School.

Building self-confidence in children is one of Stacey’s passions and she believes the dramatic arts and creative movement assists with this. She thinks these skills help create a strength that will mold the child in their future endeavors.

In her spare time, Stacey and her family enjoy karaoke, taking walks, biking, fishing, traveling to Spanish speaking countries and attending live theater. Stacey can also be found walking around the lakes with her dog and cooking for friends and family.

Kelly Weinblatt

2nd Grade

Kelly has taught on and off at Bet Shalom for 10 years and is excited to be back for year 11! When she is not teaching at Bet Shalom, she works as the Director of Marketing Tech and Automation at Lifetouch. She has two children who are in 5th and 8th grade in the Bet Shalom Religious School. In her free time she enjoys spending time with her family, baking, and traveling.

Heidi Greenberg

3rd Grade & Hebrew Cohort

Heidi grew up in Crystal, Minnesota and graduated with a Bachelor’s degree in Child Psychology from the University of Minnesota. Throughout her life, she has dedicated a lot of her time teaching children. She has worked with toddlers in preschool, school age children in public school and just after college, she worked in the hospitals taking newborn baby portraits. Besides working as an infant teacher at Shalom Yeladim, she teaches third grade and is a Bar/Bar Mitzvah tutor in the Bet Shalom Religious School. She believes that some of the most important skills to have when working with children is patience, flexibility, and love. In her spare time, she enjoys baking, spending time with her family, and reading.

Julie Friedman

4th Grade & 3rd Grade Prayer

Julie Friedman has always been passionate about facilitating others in Jewish understanding and helping youth connect to their Jewish identity. From her years as a teen counselor at her synagogue’s day camp in Illinois to working as a youth advisor at Siegel JCC in Delaware, she feels like she is always drawn back to her roots in Judaism. While teaching middle school science in New Jersey, she spent her free time involved with her synagogue, leading Pray and Play (their monthly preschool Shabbat program) and teaching second grade religious school classes.

Julie is excited to begin her sixth year teaching religious school at Bet Shalom. Julie and her family relocated to Minnesota in 2018 and are excited to be part of such a welcoming community at Bet Shalom. When Julie is not teaching at religious school, you can find her cooking, enjoying music, enjoying the outdoors, or having fun with her family.

Lauren Kofsky

5th Grade and 4th Grade Prayer

Lauren is excited to be joining us for her third year as a teacher at Bet Shalom. She was a history major who spent nine years working alongside a psychologist doing equine therapy with children and teenagers. She was a program coordinator at an adult day center working with seniors with dementia up till the pandemic. Lauren and her family are longtime members of Bet Shalom. She enjoys reading, taking dance classes, spending time with her dog, Samara, and is thrilled to be a part of the amazing Bet Shalom Religious School community.

Gayle Kaplan

HTM and Hebrew Coordinator

Gayle is starting her 15th year teaching students at the Religious School. In the past, she taught Hebrew, Torah, Jewish history, and Israel to 4th, 5th and 6th grade students. With a current focus on Hebrew, she will be teaching decoding (reading) Hebrew to 5th grade students as well as conducting Hebrew reading assessments and tutoring for grades 6 and 7. Gayle completed the training for HTM - Hebrew Through Movement. She continues to teach Hebrew to adults. She has also worked as a substitute at the Heilicher Day School.

Gayle is originally from the Boston area, received her BA from Brown University and her MBA from Northwestern University. She worked as a market research professional for a variety of organizations before switching to teaching by instructing refugees and others in business skills at the Minnesota Resource Center.

Gayle and her family (husband, son and two dogs) have been members of Bet Shalom for 24 years. She participates in both the Torah and After the Torah study groups.

Emily Rosenberg-Dejewski

6th Grade and Post B'nai Mitzvah Cohort

Emily graduated from the University of Minnesota – Twin Cities with a degree in Special Education Teaching. Emily grew up at Bet Shalom and enjoys many fond memories including her Bat Mitzvah, confirmation, and her first trip to Israel. This will be her second year teaching at Bet Shalom religious school. Emily has many years of experience working with students and looks forward to building a community within her classroom! During her free time, Emily enjoys cooking, baking, and crafting! Emily is excited to teach at Bet Shalom and be a contributing member of our loving and supportive community. Emily is currently teaching at Minnetonka Middle School West.

Madalyn Holm

6th Grade

Madalyn is so excited for her first year of teaching at Bet Shalom! Originally from Edina, she graduated from Iowa State University in 2017 with a Bachelor’s degree in Event Management. She now works as the Marketing Coordinator for MentorMate.

Madalyn has been a member at Bet Shalom since she started attending religious school as a kindergartener. She has fond memories of continuing on her religious education through her Bat Mitzvah, Confirmation and Post Confirmation. In addition, she was a madrich in a 2nd grade classroom for 5 years and was involved in the BeSty youth group. Madalyn also spent 4 months as a high school junior in Israel through the NFTY High School In Israel program.

In her spare time, she loves to travel, explore the Minneapolis restaurant scene and spend time with friends and family!

Kelsey Toetschinger

7th Grade

This is Kelsey's 4th consecutive year with the current 7th graders. She tried to take some time off to spend more time with her own family, but couldn’t stay away for long. She is especially excited to spend her third consecutive year with the now 7th graders.

Kelsey has a Bachelor’s degree in Early Childhood Education and a Master’s degree in Special Education. She is currently teaching young adults on the autism spectrum at Franklin Center, where she has been for nine years.

Kelsey lives in St. Paul with her husband James, children Henry, Oliver, and Isabella, cats Jack and Abby, and dog Kasia. She enjoys reading, watching movies, and scrapbooking (when there is time).

James Barnett

8th Grade

Shmulik Havilio

9th Grade

Shelly Christensen

Cooking Chug

Shelly Christensen is thrilled to be working with the b’nai mitzvah cohort program. She began b’nai mitzvah tutoring 23 years ago after chanting from the Torah for the first time in her life. She loved the experience so much she became one of Bet Shalom’s tutors. Shelly is a speaker, consultant, and trainer in the emerging field of diversity, equity, inclusion and belonging in Jewish community life. She is a published author. Her newest book is “From Longing to Belonging-A Practical Guide to Including People with Disabilities and Mental Health Conditions in Your Faith Community.” Shelly and Rick, who live in Burnsville, joined Bet Shalom 38 years ago. Their three sons, Aaron, Jake, and Zac grew up at Bet Shalom, and now, Aaron and Nancy continue the tradition. Their children, Eli and Isaac, are in Religious School, and Anna and Eve, are in the preschool.