Growing up in St. Louis, Missouri, Stacy Jarett Levitan’s family were active members of United Hebrew Congregation. But when it came time for her brother, Doug, to start studying for his bar mitzvah, her family moved halfway across the country to Wynnewood.
While Jarett Levitan had already had her bat mitzvah, her brother, who was 22 months younger than her, needed a different program to study for his bar mitzvah. Doug had Down syndrome.
Her family joined Main Line Reform Temple for its special education religious school.
Her mother, she told Philadelphia Jewish Exponent, was an active disability advocate. “I suppose I kind of followed in her footsteps.”
Jarett Levitan practiced commercial litigation for 10 years at Schnader Harrison Segal & Lewis LLP, occasionally taking on pro bono cases for people with disabilities. But when she had children, she decided to take a step back and focus on parenting.
At the time, her brother became a Judith Creed Horizons for Achieving Independence (JCHAI) member, a nonprofit organization that empowers adults with developmental disabilities and differences to live as independently as possible.
In 2007, Jarett Levitan became the executive director of JCHAI.
“It’s a very, very different organization, and part of it is just over time, we really learned a lot about helping people with disabilities living as independently as possible in the community,” Jarett Levitan explained. “While we started in this more residential model, we also started helping people with social programming. We have educators who go out into the community and meet with people one-to-one [to] teach them independent living skills.”
She added, “We’re really strategically located around the Philadelphia area to try to have a whole mix of activities for everybody who lives near those different geographic hubs. It’s a much broader array of services that we’re offering now and we also decided that we’re kind of out of the group home model.”
Today, JCHAI has one group home. However, most members of the program live in commercial apartment complexes alongside neurotypical people.
JCHAI was founded in 1987 by Jewish families who were dissatisfied with the existing options for their adult children with disabilities. The organization started as a group home in Wynnewood and has since grown to more than 300 members.
“My parents were involved in the beginning to some extent, and … once JCHAI existed, they always kind of figured that Doug would end up there and he did,” said Jarett Levitan.
“I just was always interested in it,” she said, referring to her decision to join JCHAI’s professional team. “This was kind of a perfect blend of my skills, and obviously something that I really appreciate on a whole lot of different levels because of my family.”
Still living in Wynnewood today, Jarett Levitan has served on the board and the executive committee at Temple Beth Hillel-Beth El, where she is a member. She has also served on the board of the Jewish Community High School of Gratz College.
“I feel like Jewish education is really important, and I am very glad that our children had the education that they did, because they’re very proud of their Jewish identity and have continued to live Jewish lives into their young adulthood,” added Jarett Levitan.
While JCHAI members are mostly non-Jewish adults, Jarett Levitan said JCHAI’s importance comes from the fact that, “there will always be ways for our Jewish members to continue to experience their Jewish identity because we make that available to them.”
“I just think that in this particular time that we’re living through, being Jewish is just not necessarily the easiest thing. I guess I feel like we just were always going through this very golden age of being Jewish,” she said. “I think when you know a lot about your Jewish identity, it really makes it that much more important for you to stand up for it.”