July 29, 2004

A Specialist in Working With the Developmentally Disabled Comes to Chicago:
OU’s Yachad Appoints Efrem Popel as Chicago Coordinator

With a background of years of dedication to Jewish children and young adults with special needs, Efrem Popel has been appointed the new Chicago Coordinator for Yachad.

“Yachad,” the flagship program of the Orthodox Union’s National Jewish Council for Disabilities (NJCD), provides unique social, educational and recreational programs for individuals with learning, developmental and physical disabilities. The program emphasizes mainstreaming Yachad members with their non-disabled peers.

Since the age of 14, Mr. Popel has been committed to programs that service children with a wide range of disabilities. Now, as the Chicago Coordinator for Yachad, he will be responsible for creating monthly programs as well as Shabbatonim (weekend retreats) for Yachad members and their mainstream peers.

“My goal for Yachad in Chicago is to foster an atmosphere of inclusion by facilitating friendships between young people with special needs and their non-disabled peers through exciting programs and unique learning opportunities,” said Mr. Popel. As an undergraduate majoring in Special Education at Brooklyn College in New York, he worked for Yachad as a Chapter Coordinator. Mr. Popel has also worked for Junior Yachad, which mainstreams Jewish children with special needs with their non-disabled elementary school peers, and worked with Yachad’s Rayim chapter, a program for adults with special needs, which like Junior Yachad, focuses on mainstreaming.

“Efrem is passionate about his work with Yachad and is extremely talented,” declared Mrs. Chani Hermann, Yachad’s National Programs Director. “I know he will create programs that will give our Yachad members opportunities to grow and to be a part of the Jewish communities in which they live.”

After receiving a M.A. from Adelphi University in New York in Special Education and another M.A. from Baruch College in New York in Educational Administration and Leadership, Mr. Popel taught in New York City public schools in a bi-lingual Yiddish-English program for students with mental retardation.

Over the past few years Mr. Popel has organized a Camp HASC (the Hebrew Academy for Special Children) Simchat Torah reunion for 350 developmentally disabled campers and their counselors.

He and his wife Shuli will be moving to Chicago and plan to settle in the West Rogers Park area. Mr. Popel will be teaching for the North Suburban Special Education District (NSSED) at the Sherwood School in Highland Park, IL.

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The Orthodox Union, now in its second century of service to the Jewish community of North America and beyond, is a world leader in community and synagogue services, adult education, youth work through NCSY, political action through the IPA, and advocacy for persons with disabilities through Yachad and Our Way. Its kosher supervision label, the , is the world’s most recognized kosher symbol and can be found on over 275,000 products manufactured in 68 countries around the globe.

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