Jay Ruderman

Jay Ruderman was born in Boston to Marcia and Morton E. Ruderman, the eldest of three children.[1] Ruderman's father was a founder of Meditech.[2] Ruderman attended public schools in Lynnfield, Massachusetts, and received his undergraduate degree in 1988 from Brandeis University,[3] where he served as president of the student body in 1986–1987. He earned his JD from Boston University School of Law in 1993.[4] Ruderman is married to Israeli-American Shira Menashe Ruderman, who serves as executive director of the Ruderman Foundation.[5]Ruderman met Shira while living in Israel and attending an ulpan where she was teaching.[6]

Ruderman lives in the Greater Boston area and has four children.[7]

Ruderman began his career as Assistant District Attorney in Salem, MA and also worked as Deputy Director of AIPAC before enlisting in the Israeli Defense Forces. He then went back to AIPAC as Leadership Director in Israel before assuming a position at the Ruderman Family Foundation.[8]

In addition, Ruderman served on the board of directors of the National Organization on Disability.[9] He sits on the board of governors of the University of Haifa,[10] the Jewish Agency for Israel[11] and the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee,[12] and is a member of the Gann Academy's Board of Trustees.[13]

Ruderman says the Ruderman Foundation's first major investment was in Jewish day schools, to ensure the inclusion of children with disabilities.[14]

In November 2015, Ruderman criticized Donald Trump for mimicking the disability of New York Times writer Serge Kovaleski, who suffers from a congenital condition that affects joint movement.[15]

Ruderman released two white papers focusing on television content and people with disabilities, as well as a white paper on first responders and suicide.[16] In 2019 Jay Ruderman enacted a scholarship for students with disabilities at Yale School of Drama with the goal of increasing authentic representation for disabilities in Hollywood.[17] Since then, Ruderman has also focused on increasing authentic representation in the entertainment industry.[18] Despite recent improvements in authentic casting in 2020, Ruderman has emphasized that the low representation on screen had implications in shaping attitudes towards people with disabilities.[19]

Ruderman works with actors, disability activists and celebrities to spread awareness of disability inclusion in the entertainment industry. Some of them serve on the Ruderman Family Foundation's International Advisory Council.[20]

Ruderman partnered with Variety Magazine for Variety's 2019 Inclusion Summit, where panelists discussed disability inclusion in entertainment.[21][22] Ruderman and his wife have also been credited with helping to bring disability inclusion to the Oscars. In 2020, Zack Gottsagen, an actor who has Down syndrome, presented an award with actor Shia LaBeouf.[23]

In February 2019, Ruderman collaborated with a disabled rights group, LINK20, in an appeal to rename Major League Baseball's "disabled list," the 'injured list.' [24]

In May 2019, Ruderman announced that his foundation would award a Seal of Authentic Representation to television or feature film projects featuring actors with disabilities in substantial acting roles.

At the 2020 Sundance Film Festival, Ruderman pushed to improve accessibility and the inclusion of people with disabilities and diversity.[25]

In March 2020, Ruderman organized an event in which Peter and Bobby Farrelly were awarded the Morton E. Ruderman Award in Inclusion for hiring actors with disabilities.[26]

In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, Ruderman expressed concern about the effects on the mental health of first responders and healthcare workers.[27] He also announced grants to workers at Massachusetts General Hospital and the Boston Police Foundation to support their mental health.[28]

Ruderman is actively involved in fostering understanding between American Jewry and Israel.[29] He was among several signatories of an ad expressing disappointment over the stance of the Israeli government on egalitarian prayer at the Western Wall.[30] Ruderman was also critical of the comment of Israel's Minister of Education regarding the high rate of intermarriage among American Jews.[31] Ruderman was quoted as saying the "doomsday talks of an irreversible chasm between Israel and the American Jewish community were mistaken," in light of a recent Ruderman Family Foundation survey and in response to the notion that the bond between U.S. Jews and Israel is weakening.[32]

Ruderman was critical of the movie Don't Worry, He Won't Get Far on Foot for casting Joaquin Phoenix in the role of a disabled man instead of an actor with a disability.[33]

In July 2017, he similarly condemned[34] the movie Blind starring Alec Baldwin and Demi Moore on grounds that Baldwin played a blind character. In his view the movie was "just the latest example of treating disability as a costume."[35][36] He likened the casting of able-bodied actors to portray characters with disabilities to blackface[37] and states that it's time for society to condemn the practice just like casting white actors to play black characters is no longer socially acceptable.[38] The incident led to written exchanges between the movie's director, Michael Mailer, and Ruderman, both published by the industry publication Deadline.com.[39][40]

Ruderman also criticized Me Before You for its portrayal of disability: The protagonist–who is paralyzed–ends up committing suicide because he feels his life is not worth living. Ruderman stated: "To the millions of people with significant disabilities currently leading fulfilling, rich lives, it posits that they are better off committing suicide."[41][42] Ruderman's second major point in this controversy was that it is problematic for an able-bodied actor to play a character with a disability, a topic he often speaks up about.[43]

In 2016 Ruderman was named by The Jerusalem Post as one of the 50 most influential Jews of the year.[44]

• Honorary doctorate from University of Haifa, Israel (2015)[45]
• Honorary doctorate from Brandeis University (2018)[46]
• Jacob Rader Marcus Award from the American Jewish Archives (2019)[47]
• Media Access Awards SAG-AFTRA Disability Awareness Award (2019) [48]

• "Ultrawealthy Donors Shouldn't Continue to Call the Shots at Jewish Charities," Chronicle of Philanthropy [49]
• "Leveraging Israeli-Americans for the Benefit of the Wider Community," eJewish Philanthropy [50]
• "Stop Enabling Donors Outsized Influence on Jewish Life," The Forward [51]
• "People with Disabilities are the Forgotten Vulnerable," The Hill [52]
• "In Jewish Philanthropy, a Case Study of How a Crisis Can Expand Communal Giving," Inside Philanthropy [53]
• "The road to full inclusion: How to accommodate people with disabilities more fully, 30 years after the ADA," New York Daily News[54]

• Jay Ruderman's Author Page on the Jerusalem Post
• Jay Ruderman's Author Page on the Times of Israel
• Jay Ruderman's Author Page on Fathom Journal
• Jay Ruderman's Podcast: All Inclusive