The Covenant Foundation, sponsor of the prestigious Covenant Awards for Excellence in Jewish Education, and a philanthropic fund that supports promising and innovative ideas in Jewish education, named Harlene Winnick Appelman, a distinguished Jewish educator from Ann Arbor, MI and herself one of the first winners of the Covenant Awards, as its Executive Director in June 2005. Prior to this appointment, Ms. Appelman worked in Jewish education for nearly twenty-five years, as a pioneering family educator, director of community education and outreach, and most recently as Chief Jewish Education Officer of the Jewish Federation of Metropolitan Detroit. Known internationally as a creative force in Jewish education on both the institutional and communal levels, Ms. Appelman won the Covenant Award in 1991 and was invited to join the Board of Directors in 1994. "She is an outstanding educator, a genuine innovator, and an able administrator. She has demonstrated wonderful leadership, a commitment to excellence and openness to talent wherever it may be found. In many ways, Ms. Appelman embodies the spirit and the mission of the Covenant Foundation," said Susan Crown, whose Chicago-based family created the Covenant Foundation in partnership with JESNA in 1990, and who serves as the Foundation's President. "The position of Executive Director of the Covenant Foundation offers an opportunity to build on a carefully laid foundation of excellence and integrity," stated Ms. Appelman. "This is a chance to shine a spotlight on gifted people and great ideas, including the ‘hidden gems,' that contribute to the field and often go uncelebrated. I am humbled by the possibilities that this position offers to work collaboratively with educators and institutions from every segment of the community. Helping to take the Covenant Foundation to the next level of impact is an extraordinary opportunity." It is clear that this hope of five years ago has turned into reality, as Ms. Appelman has led the Covenant Foundation to having a great deal of impact on Jewish education. Ms. Appelman's career includes positions as Director of Family Life Education at Congregation Shaarey Zedek in Detroit, founding head of Jewish Experiences for Families (a national model in the field of family education), Director of Community Outreach and Education for the Jewish Federation, and Executive Director of Detroit's Alliance for Jewish Education. Ms. Appelman headed the creative team for Shalom Street, a hands-on Jewish children's museum, and was part of the creative team for Hadassah's Al Galgalim (Training Wheels), an acclaimed family program. In addition to directing its Awards program, Ms. Appelman guides the Covenant Foundation's grants program which allocates funds to support innovative projects in Jewish education across the continent. The Foundation has placed special emphasis on the need to attract and support talented young people to enter and remain in the field of Jewish education. It also sponsors a Covenant Fellows program for younger educators that provides them with recognition, mentoring and opportunity to pursue new projects of their own choosing early in the careers. Jonathan Woocher, CIO of JESNA and a Covenant Board member, praised Ms. Appelman as a "professional who is admired and respected throughout the Jewish educational world, someone I treasure as a colleague and friend. She is both a thinker and a doer, someone who can work effectively within the community's infra-structure and at the same time think ‘out of the box.' " Under Harlene's professional leadership over the last five years, the Covenant Foundation has undertaken a process of strategic planning and implementation that has resulted in strengthening the Foundation's role as a convener of important conversations in Jewish education, in forging connections among its grantees and award winners, in the inauguration of a new "ignition grants" program to help new ventures, and in a pioneering approach to evaluation that emphasizes the learnings that the field can derive from the projects the Foundation supports. The Foundation also held a stellar 18th anniversary celebration, and has continued to focus attention on important emerging areas like technology and Jewish education. The Covenant Foundation has recognized more than 40 outstanding educators and has awarded grants totaling more than $10,000,000 for over 100 promising ideas.