Alumni Spotlight: Joel Frankel (B'07)

As a student at Emory, Joel Frankel was active in Jewish life. He was president of Emory Students for Israel, active in Hillel's JBiz Roundtable, and went with Hillel on an alternative winter break trip to Guatemala. The consumate networker, Joel was always finding ways to bring people together. In short, Joel was a passionate community builder on campus.

Joel graduated from Emory in 2007 to pursue a business careeer in New York, where he worked as an analyst for Nielsen’s Business Consulting Services Group. His journey eventually brought him to law school at Washington University in St. Louis.

Joel has now found a way to mesh his professional aspirations with his personal passions. Joel recently began working for the Jewish Federation of Saint Louis as the Israel Engagement Professional - a job devoted to finding, connecting with, and bringing together young Jews returning from programs in Israel.

“My goal is to get as many young adults as possible involved in the Jewish community in St. Louis, helping to create a vibrant and sustainable community where young adults play a major role,” says Joel.

This is networking of the highest order. Joel describes his approach as "consierge-style service" by getting to know people on an individual basis and helping them plug into existing, appropriate Jewish programming and venues. “After connecting with people individually, I leverage the structures already in place to connect people to each other,” he explains.

Joel's experience at Emory as a leader and community builder no doubt gave him the experience and skills to do an exceptional job in this new role. We wish him continued success and look forward to see the many ways in which Joel will make a valuable impact on the Jewish community.