A member of Temple B’nai Abraham for 48 years, Ruth is a tireless Co-Chair of TBA’s Social Action Committee, as well as Recording Secretary of Sisterhood—The Women’s Connection. She is a vital part of the learning programs sponsored by the Temple and is a graduate of the Florence Melton Jewish Adult School, where she continues to study today. She is also a member of the Temple’s Ways & Means Committee and Board of Trustees. Ruth served as Chair of the Board of Education for several years, and she and her late husband Gary worked to resettle Russian Jews in the 1990s.

Born and raised in Bound Brook, NJ, Ruth graduated from Bound Brook High School in 1959, attended Penn State University for one year, and graduated from Douglass College in 1963 with a B.A. in English and a minor in Secondary Education. She taught secondary school English for 34 years, in Maryland, at Solomon Schechter Day School (now Golda Och Academy), Chatham Middle School and Chatham High School, where she developed and taught a senior English course, “Holocaust & Genocide Through Literature.”

Ruth started her social activism early. As one of just a small number of Jews in Bound Brook, she and her friend founded a local Young Judaea chapter; she served as the President of the Central NJ region.

In addition to her TBA roles, Ruth is active on The Period Project Committee (NCJW-Essex); the New Jersey Jewish Film Festival Committee (JCC MetroWest); the JCC Life-Long Learning Committee; and New Jersey Together. She is the Secretary of the Board of the Sister Rose Thering Fund and a Co-Chair of their Literary & Visual Arts Competition. She is a member of the Mark E. Schonwetter Foundation, helping to award grants to teachers all over the U.S. to further Holocaust education. In 2023, she helped organize the first Kristallnacht commemoration held at Seton Hall University.

Ruth cooks and delivers two lasagnas a month to needy families through Lasagna Love. She has written for local newspapers as a drama critic and since 2010 has published her own blog, the NJ Arts Maven.

Ruth is the mother of two daughters, Natalie Sherman and Leslie Nordin, and the grandmother of four: Olivia and Abby Nengel and Sawyer and Riley Nordin. She has lived in West Orange for 54 years.