JHF Features Israeli HER Program at IWF Meeting

Iris Stern Levi

On November 30, Jewish Healthcare Foundation (JHF) President and CEO Karen Wolk Feinstein, PhD, and COO and Chief Program Officer Nancy Zionts helped to organize the International Women's Forum (IWF) Pittsburgh program on "Supporting Persons Who Seek to Exit Prostitution, Sexual Exploitation and Domestic Violence: A Global Challenge for Women's Health." Dr. Feinstein interviewed Iris Stern Levi, an Israeli social activist and cofounder of HER Academy, a vocational school for women coming out of sexual exploitation and violence in Israel. Levi presented the academy's work as an international best practice model for training and supporting women from diverse backgrounds and connecting them with professionals in various fields, so they may gain economic stability in a new profession.

The IWF program also featured a panel on Pittsburgh's resources and responses to sex work and sexual exploitation, moderated by Elizabeth Miller, MD, PhD, FSAHM, Division Director, Adolescent and Young Adult Medicine and Professor of Pediatrics, Public Health and Clinical and Translational Science from the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, and featuring panelists Shayla Sojourner, LSW, supervisor of Project Traffick Stop, Pittsburgh Action Against Rape; Twanda Clark-Edgal, chief program officer of Gwen's Girls; Rashod Xavier Brown, Community Health Specialist at Project Silk; and Yasaswi Kislovskiy, MD MSc, director of reproductive infectious disease in the department of OB/Gyn and the Women's Institute at Allegheny Health Network.

Watch Karen Feinstein's interview with Iris Stern Levi here.