Welcome to

debbiefink&co.

and to

Jewish Involvement Theatre (JIT),

done debbie-style: 

Scroll down, down, down to soar up, up, up!    

Debbie Fink currently serves as the Director of Community Outreach & Impact for RespectAbility, a national, nonpartisan nonprofit that advocates on behalf of all people with disabilities.  In this role, Debbie oversees its national, secular Volunteer Corps as well as its faith-based efforts in Jewish Inclusion.

Prior to joining RespectAbility’s dynamic team – and amidst Debbie’s other secular Tikkun Olam projects – debbiefink&co. emerged.  As a writer and ‘edu-tainer’ (educator + entertainer), all of Debbie’s projects are rooted in character education / middot.  She has crafted and conducted workshops and performances for over 70,000 students, educators, parents, service members, wounded warriors and others worldwide.  Debbie had the great honor of edu-taining America’s troops’ families as a USO Tour Veteran; the USO invited her to take her messages and books on tours throughout South Korea, Japan/Okinawa, Italy, and Germany.  Meanwhile, Debbie has conducted her interactive Jewish edu-tainment in the U.S. and Canada.

Debbie’s Jewish Chai-lights:

• Served as a Hillel Director;  

• Lived/studied//danced/worked in Israel for four years and visits regularly;

• Chaired, crafted, and directed a $1.2 million fundraiser for Israel;

1. •    Selected by Jewish Women International (JWI) as one of its Jewish HERoes
   

      (http://www.jwi.org/Page.aspx?pid=3199);

• Recorded a Jewish CD (folk violin/vocals) All in Good Time with former musical troupe Calliope;

•Led ~ 200 horas at Jewish events worldwide and co-led ~180 havdalot ceremonies;

•Involved with ongoing co-creations of musically-infused, multi-sensory Jewish experiences for synagogue services and other Jewish venues;

•Co-led music and dance for over a dozen Women's Seders, including writing a Haggadah for, and leading, a UJA Federation Women’s Seder;

•Conceptualized and co-authored The Ethical Covenant:  A Practical Guide to Creating Honorable Menschen and A Moral, Caring Community for the Charles E. Smith Jewish Day School of MD; and

•Created, conducted, and performed multiple "Jewish Involvement Theatre" (JIT) productions, directing/performing them throughout the DC/MD/VA/NY area and Canada (e.g., the international JEA Conference in Washington, D.C. and the Canadian Council for Conservative Synagogues in Toronto).

Debbie enjoys sculpting JIT productions – powerful, humorous, interactive, multi-character, multi-perspective, one-woman shows – they reach, teach, and touch participants’ minds and neshamot (souls). 

Debbie believes that JIT’s pedagogic paradigm is Jewish theatre that respectfully tackles any topic and makes it meaningful, joyful, and thought-provoking for all who participate. The JIT productions get to the heart of the matter, and participants leave with much more insight on that topic than they came.

JIT’s Basic Pedagogic Formula:

•Opening - 2-4 minutes (movement / sign language)

•First Character’s Monologue (5-10 minutes)         –– Followed by a facilitated discussion

•Second Character’s Monologue  (5-10 minutes)   –– Followed by a facilitated discussion

•Third Character’s Monologue (5-10 minutes)      –– Followed by a facilitated discussion

•Fourth Character’s Discussion (5-10 minutes)     –– Followed by a facilitated discussion

•Group Interview of one Character

  (Participants vote on one character to bring back to interview)

•Closing - 3-5 minutes (movement / participants learn sign language)

Commissioned by synagogues, schools, and Jewish organizations, Debbie’s JIT and other innovative works include:  

•Queen Vashti: Taking the First Public Stand Against Domestic Violence;

1. •RiverSpeak: Stories of Heroism Told from the Banks of the Nile, Danube, and Potomac Rivers;
   

•RiverSpeak: An Interactive Seder Told from the Banks of the Nile, Danube, and Severn Rivers;   

•The Growing Tree: Nurturing Our Children’s Jewish Roots and Limbs;

•Breaking Through the Glass:  Joining our Children on Their Jewish Journey;

•Im Ein Ani Li, Mi Li? Taking Care of Me, 2010 (for 6th graders);

•I’m Sorry.  I’m Sorry.  I’m Sorry.  Slicha. (A High Holiday performance);

•Israel Through the Decades Honors (Commissioned scriptwriter and Director)

• Hoedown Horas!

•Wills of Iron, Souls of Steel:  A Women’s Seder for UJA’s Federation of Washington, D.C.

Below is a series of photo montages, ending with a Washington Jewish Week article about JIT that features Debbie’s work. 

(Note: performances performed on Shabbat or Yomim Tovim have no photos . . . )

While ‘a picture’s worth a thousand words,’ there’s no substitute for the actual, real-live experience!