Meet Our Scholars

Elizabeth Amara is from Miami, Florida. She served as a Grassroots Coordinator for Ron DeSantis’ gubernatorial campaign and later worked on the Trump campaign through voter outreach, canvassing, and community engagement efforts across South Florida. She is the founder and three-year president of the Turning Point USA Aventura Chapter, where she organized civic engagement events and interfaith discussions focused on political dialogue and voter literacy. Elizabeth has completed leadership fellowships through the Tikvah Scholars Program, Leadership Institute, Solomon Leadership Program, and the Simon Wiesenthal Center. She also serves as an intern with AllSides, contributing to media and political research. Elizabeth is also bilingual in Spanish and Portuguese.

Ayla Blumberg graduated from Akiba Yavneh Academy of Dallas, Texas, where she graduated second in her class, earned the AP Scholar with Distinction designation, and was in the National STEM Honor Society. At Yavneh, she served on the Student Activities Board, organizing Judaic programming and fundraising, and through the Jewish Community Relations Council, led presentations on Judaism in public schools to combat anti-semitism and facilitate interfaith dialogue. As a Board Member of Points for Peace, she helped co-raise $50,000 through a community-wide basketball tournament for anti-terrorism advocacy. She also served as President of the Math Club and as a STEM teachers’ assistant throughout high school. Ayla is a published author, certified yoga instructor, and recently passed the real estate licensing exam. She is passionate about Jewish life, leadership, and the intersection of ancient wisdom and emerging technologies. Ayla plans to major in Civics Honors with a second major in Business Management.

Zachary Ingham graduated from Jesuit College Preparatory School in Dallas, Texas, where he served as editor-in-chief of the school newspaper, the Jesuit Roundup, authoring 22 articles on topics ranging from the war in Ukraine to U.S. domestic politics to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. He was elected Hunt County Commissioner at Texas Boys State, participated in the Dallas NextGen Roundtable policy summit, and volunteered at the Jewish Family Service of Greater Dallas food pantry. As the only practicing Jew at a Catholic school, Zachary developed a distinctive vantage point on Jewish identity and the Western tradition.

Zachary (Zack) Levy is a graduate of The Abraham Joshua Heschel School and an incoming freshman at the University of Texas at Austin, where he plans to study Civics Honors in the School of Civic Leadership and Plan II Honors in the College of Liberal Arts. At Heschel, he served as Student Government Vice President and was President of both the Interfaith Club and Sports Analytics Club. He captained both the varsity ultimate frisbee and soccer teams and competed in the NFL Flag Football Championships. He also taught at Sutton Place Synagogue Religious School and received the President’s Volunteer Service Award for his commitment to community engagement. His civic record includes the ADL Bridge Building program, the AJC Leaders for Tomorrow program – through which he took a Capitol Hill lobbying trip against antisemitism – the Scholas Occurrentes Interfaith Communities in Motion Conference, and a Vatican-sponsored interfaith conference. He received the Fred W. Stimler Golden Eagle Award, given to two athletes out of 6,000 in the Yorkville Youth Athletic Association for exceptional leadership on and off the field.

Josie Mandrea is a junior at the University of Texas at Austin studying Civics Honors while pursuing certificates in Business Spanish and Security Studies. Originally from Northbrook, Illinois, she graduated from Glenbrook North High School where she captained the varsity tennis team, led the Israeli Culture Club, and served on the regional board of BBYO Great Midwest Region. Additionally, she studied at Alexander Muss High School in Israel, interned with Jewish National Fund, and was selected for the Sababa Fellowship. She also spent a summer volunteering across Ecuador while strengthening her Spanish proficiency. At the University of Texas, Josie was selected as an Embedded Scholar, a highly selective research fellowship focused on democracy assistance and development. This summer, she will conduct field research with CID Gallup, a leading market research company, in Panama City. On campus, she also serves as an Engagement Intern with Texas Hillel, Programming Chair for Israel Block Party, Director of Facility Management for the Alpha Delta Pi sorority, and a volunteer with Micah 6 Food Bank.

Ethan Roberson graduated in the top 1% of his class from Marcus High School in Flower Mound, Texas. Born in Haifa, Israel, and raised across Massachusetts and Texas, Ethan served as President of the 100-member school orchestra, rising to first chair in the Marcus Chamber Orchestra as a six-time LISD First Division Solo & Ensemble awardee and All-Region qualifier on double bass. A National Merit Finalist, he was also a Wharton Global Youth Investment Competition finalist and Vice President of the Finance Club. Ethan has volunteered regularly with refugee families through his church and the Rio Valley Relief Project, mentored students with special needs through United Sound, and co-invented a US patent at biotech startup Blackbox. He is passionate about humanitarian finance, music, and building bridges across cultural and political divides in the US, Israel, and abroad. He plans to major in Strategy and Statecraft with a second major in International Business, Management, or Supply Chain Management at McCombs.

Barri Seitz is a senior at the University of Texas at Austin from Atlanta, Georgia, pursuing a dual degree in Plan II Honors and Human Dimensions of Organization, with minors in Hebrew and Philosophy, Politics and Economics. A National Merit Finalist, she graduated from The Weber School and arrived at UT with fluent Hebrew, which she has deepened through coursework including two semesters of Intensive Hebrew and a course in Israeli Society and Culture. In high school, she served as Leadership Team Chair for the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society, raising over $230,000 for blood cancer research, and attended Alexander Muss High School in Israel. At UT, she co-founded Longhorn Students for Israel and chaired Texas Hillel’s Israel Block Party, the largest pro-Israel campus event in North America. She is currently serving as President of the University Panhellenic Council, where she oversees 13 organizations representing over 4,000 members and managed a $280,000 recruitment budget. Her Plan II Honors thesis proposes to compare the assimilation and acculturation practices of interwar Polish-Jewish youth movements with those of contemporary American Jewish youth organizations. She is pursuing a career in consulting, with a summer 2026 internship at KPMG Advisory.

Tzur Shalit completed high school in three years, graduating from the Blue & White Academy homeschool while also earning two associate degrees from Austin Community College in Peace & Conflict Studies and Government, where he made Chancellor’s Honor Roll every semester and earned an Honors Scholar award. As a moot court competitor, he was invited to the National Judicial Competition three times, won the Maimonides Moot Court Competition, and won the Harlan Institute Supreme Court Competition. In 2025, he won election as the 78th Chief Justice of the Texas Youth and Government Program among 1,300 students. His thought is shaped by Clausewitz’s On War and Plato’s Republic, and his engagement with Tikvah-affiliated programming includes the James Madison Program Summer Seminar at Princeton, the UT Austin Youth and Community Studies Fellowship, published essays on Jewish military ethics and Maimonides, and original research presented at the ACC Symposium. He also founded ACC’s first chess club and created the Legal Interview Project. At the School of Civic Leadership, he plans to study Civics Honors and Strategy and Statecraft.

Isaac Shor graduated from the Emery/Weiner School in Houston, Texas. As president of the chess club, he organized school-wide tournaments and created an after-school chess tutoring program for disadvantaged youth at the Nehemiah Center of Houston. A two-sport athlete, Isaac played varsity soccer and lacrosse throughout high school, earning the Scholar Athlete Award, the Herzl Hill Award, and two All-State selections as a lacrosse defenseman. He was a member of the National Honor Society. Isaac served on the Bellaire Youth Council, lobbied Texas politicians for increased security funding for Houston-area Jewish institutions, and participated in the national march for Israel in Washington. At Texas Boys State, he was elected by his peers to serve as precinct chairman, county delegate, county commissioner, and state delegate. He has shadowed both a neurologist and a dentist; his long-term goal is medicine, with PPEL as the vehicle for connecting ethical frameworks to health policy.

Julian Shulman graduated summa cum laude from Chapel Hill High School in Chapel Hill, North Carolina. As president of his school’s Save The Music club, he taught guitar and organized volunteer music lessons at local elementary schools. In 2025, he was awarded the Pauli Murray Student Award for his ceramic piece. A Tikvah Solomon Fellow and alumnus of the Tikvah Scholars Program, he is drawn to intellectual discourse in philosophy and geopolitics, and has taken up independent study of Abarbanel, Spinoza, and the Zohar. He also serves as co-president of the inaugural class of the Abarbanel Institute, a summer educational program for Jewish teens hosted in Amsterdam, the Netherlands.

Jordyn Spalding graduated from Akiba Yavneh Academy in Dallas, Texas, where she served as Student Body President and founded her school’s Model United Nations program. Throughout high school, she was heavily involved in community service activities, earning recognition for her leadership. Jordyn participated in various organizations including Friendship Circle and Students Against Terrorism, where she helped organize community initiatives and fundraising efforts, raising $50,000 for October 7 victims. Jordyn became the first girl in her school’s history to play on the boys’ varsity soccer team, where she served as captain and earned TAPPS 3A First Team All-State honors, while also captaining the girls varsity basketball and soccer teams. Outside of school, Jordyn worked as a camp counselor and activities director. She values teamwork, honesty, and community involvement.

Leora Tripp recently completed a gap year in Israel, studying Politics and Hebrew Language through the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. During her gap year, Leora founded and led a community fitness and Pilates initiative that raised funds in support of the IDF, and spent time volunteering at the Tel Aviv Medical Center. A summa cum laude graduate of Donna Klein Jewish Academy in Boca Raton, Florida, Leora served as Board President of the Teens of Pink Ribbon Association through which she led breast cancer education seminars across 35 schools, Lead Attorney of the Mock Trial Team, Concert Master and First Chair Violinist in her school orchestra, and Founder of Pink Pack Pals, a nonprofit supporting families of cancer patients that has received international recognition. She also published original breast cancer research presented at the Johns Hopkins Global Health Leaders Conference. A passionate advocate for Israel and Western values, Leora is eager to bridge the gap between history and modern dialogue.