About Me

Gender

Female

Birthday

14/11/1972

Dafna Michaelson is the founder, president and JourneyWoman for the 50 in 52 Journey, a project for which she traveled across America to all 50 states and Washington, D.C., spanning the 52 weeks of 2009 to find America's problem solvers and idea generators. Through this Journey, Dafna has been sharing the stories of ordinary people doing extraordinary things for their communities, with the goal of inspiring others to action.

The project received national attention from numerous major media outlets, countless blog recognition, and several awards for social media for social good, as people across the United States became motivated by the Journey.

Now, Dafna has launched the Journey Institute with her partner in community and life, Michael Jenet. She is using what she has learned to begin assisting people nationwide in taking their ideas off of the couch and putting them into action in their communities through connections and support from the Journey team.

Prior to her travels, Dafna was Director of Volunteer Services and Patient Information for Denver Health and Hospitals Authority, where she became credentialed as a Certified Administrator of Volunteer Services, an American Hospital Association Designation. She is a graduate of the University of Denver, Daniels College of Business, the Yeshiva University Stern College for Women, and the Cincinnati School for the Creative and Performing Arts.

In the community, beginning in high school Dafna was an active participant in the Kentucky Indiana Ohio Region of the B'nai Brith Youth Organization (BBYO). She also is a life member of Hadassah, the Women’s Zionist Organization of America, and in 2009 completed a two-year term as President of the Denver Chapter. She is an alumna of Leadership Denver, a program of the Denver Metro Chamber Foundation, and the Downtown Denver Partnership 2007 leadership program. In 2007 she received an appointment from Mayor John Hickenlooper to the Denver Women’s Commission.

Dafna began writing lesson plans in the late 1990s in her role as director of the March of the Living for the Board of Jewish Education of Greater New York. She continues to use those skills today to develop lesson plans for people age 7 to 107 based on the 50 in 52 Journey. Her lesson plans are featured on The Random Acts of Kindness website.

Dafna shares her life with her fiancé Michael Jenet, his son and her two children.

State

Ohio

City / Town

Cincinnati

Country

United States

Website

http://www.journeyinstitute.org

Friends