Rabbi Betsy Forester/Rav Batya joined Beth Israel Center as our spiritual leader in 2018.  She is a warm, intellectual, caring, and visionary leader and master educator. Our kahal has been enriched through Rabbi Betsy/Rav Batya’s ability to helping people build meaningful lives through transformative Jewish experiences rich in authenticity, depth, empowerment, intellectual rigor, sacredness, and joy. She melds the best of Jewish tradition with a love of humanity and dedication to improving our world. 

Rabbi Betsy/ Rav Batya has spent her entire life deeply engaged in Jewish life. Her practice accords with traditional, egalitarian, forward-thinking, Conservative Judaism. She was a leader in USY and attended Camp Ramah in Wisconsin, including 6 summers on staff. Prior to becoming our Rabbi, she led numerous religious and educational programs in synagogue, school, professional, and camp settings.

Rabbi Betsy/ Rav Batya chose the traditional model of private s’michah (ordination) through an individualized, thoughtfully designed, post-denominational program in which she studied with world-class rabbis and scholars across the denominational spectrum. Her training included coursework at the Jewish Theological Seminary of America (JTS). Rabbi Forester has also studied at the Svara Yeshiva and Hadar Institute and completed a unit of Clinical Pastoral Education (CPE). Her rabbinical training and ordination were supervised by a beit din (rabbinic court), and she was ordained on June 4, 2018, by Rabbi Irwin Kula, Executive Director of The National Jewish Center for Learning and Leadership (CLAL). Rabbi Betsy/ Rav Batya’s path to the rabbinate prepared her to understand the needs of the present moment and to make Jewish learning and practice relevant to today’s seekers at every stage of life.

Rabbi Betsy/ Rav Batya holds a B.A. in Hebrew and Semitic Studies and Communicative Disorders, with a certificate in Integrated Liberal Studies, from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. She holds an M.A. in Speech-Language Pathology from Northwestern University and an M.A. in Jewish Professional Studies from Spertus Institute for Jewish Learning and Leadership. Before coming to Beth Israel Center, Rabbi Forester served as Director of Jewish Life and Learning at Solomon Schechter Day School of Metropolitan Chicago. Prior to that, she taught Talmud, Tanakh (Bible), and T’fillah (Prayer) to adolescents, mentored Judaic Studies teachers, and worked nationally to develop standards for prayer education and Talmud education. Earlier in her career she was a speech-language pathologist.

The Rabbi and her husband, Scott, have three adult children. Rena lives on a moshav in northern Israel, where she works as a health and nutrition coach and instructor in yoga and mindfulness; Benjy is a fifth-year rabbinical student at JTS; and Shira, a UW-Madison graduate and former Beth Israel Talmud Torah teacher, teaches Judaic Studies at the Luria Academy in Brooklyn, NY. Scott has his own CFO consulting company and is actively engaged in growing Madison’s entrepreneurial community.