Rabbi Joy Levitt is the interim Director of Adult Engagement at Central Synagogue. She is the Director of J-Lab, a project of the Marlene Meyerson JCC Manhattan that incubates new ideas to help strengthen Jewish life. In December, 2021, she stepped down as the CEO of the JCC after twenty-five years, helping to build into one of the most prominent centers for Jewish life and community in the United States.

Prior to coming to the JCC, Rabbi Levitt served Congregation B’nei Keshet in Montclair, New Jersey and the Reconstructionist Synagogue of the North Shore in Plandome, New York. She was the editor of the Reconstructionist Magazine and is the co-author of A Night of Questions: A Passover Haggadah.

Ordained at the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College, she received a masters from New York University and a bachelor’s degree from Barnard College.

She serves on the boards of the Trinity School, the Shefa School, the Jerusalem Foundation, Dayenu: A Jewish call to Climate Action, Israel Story, and the Jewish Book Council.

She is married to Rabbi Michael Strassfeld and together they have five children and three grandchildren.