Jamie Hogland has been appointed the Jewish Federation of Greater Portland’s Director of Programs and Engagement, the organization announced last month.
“We are delighted to welcome Jamie to our professional team,” Federation president and CEO Marc Blattner said. “Her enthusiasm, creativity, and desire to engage people is something we are excited about.”
The role, Hogland told The Jewish Review, constitutes “a magical opportunity that just kind of opened up and it was a perfect time for me in my professional life.”
Hogland’s professional life first intersected Jewish communal work when she was recruited to teach physical education for a combined group of preschool students through the Mittleman Jewish Community Center.
“I got my feet wet, and it was a lot of booger wiping and shoe tying,” Hogland recalled. “It was super fun.”
She enrolled in a program in California to learn rock climbing and swift water rescue, with the plan to lead outdoor pro-grams for the MJCC. Instead, she ended up hiring on as an instructor at that program, then teaching at a boarding school before returning to Portland to study education at Marylhurst University. She student-taught middle schoolers in Hillsboro, but her professional evolution was far from over.
“After that, made my way as an entrepreneur through the business world,” Hogland said.
It started by managing chiropractic and physical therapy clinics, then expanded to helping launch what is now Kyra’s Bake Shop through an appearance on the Food Network television series “Cupcake Wars.” After selling her stake in the gluten-free bakery, she launches an insurance agency. Now, she runs iDabble Consulting and is a co-founder of The Lava Dome, a non-profit aiming to bring an indoor youth baseball and softball complex to Oregon. She’s also the founder and President of Jewish Mothers of Oregon, a non-profit which is affiliated with the Momentum program of women’s Israel trips.
Hogland’s daughter, pitches for the Israeli national youth softball team – while they live in Portland, both Hogland and her daughter are Israeli citizens. This ended up sparking Hogland’s return to Jewish communal work; to make some extra cash to cover her daughter’s softball expenses, Hogland took on the part time role of office manager at Congregation Shir Tikvah.
“Soon enough, that morphed into me becoming the Executive Director and the not-so-part-time job of running a synagogue,” Hogland said. Nevertheless, “what I found through that was really a passion to being back in the Jewish communal world as a professional, as I had been gone for so many years.”
Among other responsibilities, Hogland will support the Student to Student program as well as serving as point person for newcomers to Portland’s Jewish community.
“I love to connect people and create relationships and put pieces together,” she said. “This job marries my background in education as well as being a connector.”
PHOTO: Rockne Roll/The Jewish Review