Sara Shadmi-Wortman (PhD) Email & Phone Number

Sara Shadmi-Wortman (PhD) is a Co-Founder & CEO at Varda Institute for Community Building based in Israel, Asia. I am Sara Shadmi-Wortman, known as Sarale. I am the Co-Founder and CEO of The Varda Institute for Community Building. I devote my professional life to helping groups and individuals live meaningfully by joining together, bringing their talents and uniqueness, and creating strong, vibrant communities that can address shared challenges. Based on my experience building a new kibbutz in Israel, leading the young Kibbutzim movement, and being a member of an educators group that established an educational center for Jewish education (HaMisrasha), I developed a new approach to strengthening communities. This approach is based on creating a culture of belonging through Community Building, and today, it is successfully implemented worldwide. During the past 30 years as a faculty member of Oranim, the Academic College of Education of the Kibbutz Movement, I developed a Community Building BA and an MA degree program. During that time, I also co-founded SHDEMOT, Oranim’s field department dedicated to leading processes of Community Building in urban, rural, and peripheral regions in Israel, impacting national policy for the Israel Association for Community Centers. Previously I established and directed a teacher training program-HOTAM and served as the Northern Regional Director of the Ministry of Education, overseeing the activities of 600 schools. I hold a BA in Sociology and Political Science, MA in Political Communication, and a Ph.D. in Community Work and Education from Tel-Aviv university. I published two books and multiple articles. I am a graduate of the 4th cohort of the Mandel School for Educational Leadership, the 7th cohort of the Maoz National Leadership Program, the Encounter Program, and a board member of the IACS.