Naomi Gamoran has spent much of her professional life teaching and supporting Jewish education, combining two passions.
She is the assistant director of George Washington University’s The Collaboratory: A Center for Jewish Education.
After college, Gamoran participated in a year of Avodah: The Jewish Service Corps. During that time, she served as an academic associate at Thurgood Marshall Academy in Washington, D.C., before working full-time as a history teacher there.
Gamoran was also a songleader at Temple Sinai in D.C. for five years.
The mom of two lives in the Columbia Heights neighborhood of D.C. She is involved with Temple Sinai and Temple Micah.
Tell me about your Jewish upbringing and background.
I grew up in Wisconsin and there were some Jewish people in my school and community. We belonged to both a Reform and Conservative synagogue. The main connection to Judaism growing up was through my family; we would do Shabbat dinner every week. My extended family on my dad’s side is incredibly connected to Judaism and we all went to the same summer camp. My parents met at [that] summer camp; my grandpa was a rabbi there. My brothers, cousins and I all went to the same summer camp. I loved my camp and worked there after college for five years [as] a songleader and a unit head.
The first time I felt really deep Jewish friendships was after college when I did Avodah and lived with a Jewish community.
How did your involvement with Avodah prepare you for your career?
There’s a lot of focus on justice — it’s about Jewish community and it’s about justice. I felt like I got to explore how to live in this world in a meaningful way and think through how I wanted to make an impact. It was clear to me in Avodah and in college that I wanted to do something related to education. That’s always been something that I’ve been passionate about. When I was in Avodah, I got to work in a high school in D.C. supporting students. After I did Avodah, I got to teach in that high school for a few years.
The biggest impact [Avodah] had on me was developing and building a Jewish community. It did prepare me for my career in some ways, but the biggest impact was helping me develop my own Jewish identity and how I wanted to be Jewish as an adult, how I wanted to foster relationships with other Jewish people in a way that I hadn’t really in the past on my own. After Avodah, we didn’t live all together, [but] it was still important to me to foster those relationships and continue to build and develop a Jewish community.
What are your responsibilities as assistant director of The Collaboratory?
The work that I’m doing now at The Collaboratory allows me to be a part of something innovative. We’re bringing a bunch of different pieces together — we have a research branch where we’re both conducting research but we’re also helping people in the field apply research to their work. I think that’s really important because I don’t want research to just sit on a shelf; we want it to be used and applied. We also have an Israel education program. We have students who are learning new methods and techniques for Israel education. We have a lot of other projects, [such as] a convening for providers of professional development and resources in the K-12 education space about antisemitism and Jewish identity.
We have a lot of programs going on that are impactful and can make a difference in the field of Jewish education and Jewish engagement, and I feel so lucky to be a little part of that. My job is the back end, so I create the systems that allow us to do all of those things.
Tell me about your musical background.
I picked up the guitar when I was at summer camp when I was maybe 15. At my summer camp, and I think at a lot of other Reform summer camps, songleaders are like rock stars; they’re the coolest people. I always liked to sing. I learned how to play the guitar and slowly learned as many songs as I could from the Jewish songbook, the Shireinu. When I was entering my sophomore year of college, the camp director called me and said, ‘We want you to be a songleader.’ So I taught songs to the kids in my unit and led services every day.
After, I started songleading at Temple Sinai, doing Sunday school music every Sunday for about five years. I found it to be an incredible way to connect with children and express Judaism through music. One of the greatest joys of my life has been being able to be a songleader.
What’s something you’re proud of?
I feel proud professionally of the way that I’m able to support all the programs that we do at The Collaboratory. There’s so much good work going on and so much impact that we’re able to have. I don’t have a Ph.D.; I’m not a researcher, so I’m not the one that’s going to be driving it, but I’m behind the car, fixing everything so they can drive the Center forward. I just feel really proud and honored to be able to be a piece of change.
