Honorees
Honorees
For more than 20 years, the Temple Israel Center community has been an integral part of Sandra and Dan’s lives. In addition to being our friends, they are role models to many of us in the professional and personal lives that they have shaped and their commitment to embody and enact Jewish values in lives of deep meaning, great contribution and true humility.
Sandra grew up in Westchester, where she was in the second graduating class of Schechter Westchester. She holds a BA in European History from the University of Pennsylvania and a JD from George Washington University. Dan was born in Jerusalem but grew up mostly in Los Angeles, California. He holds a BS in Biochemistry from the University of California, Los Angeles and a MD from the University of California, San Francisco. Dan is a Hematologist/Oncologist at White Plains Hospital and serves as Co-Medical Director of White Plains Hospital Center for Cancer Care and Director of Cancer and Blood Specialists of New York.
Sandra and Dan moved to White Plains in 1996 and joined a small group of families who sought to create a community who could not only pray together, but also share Shabbat and holidays together. Their children Diana and Jeremy began at TIC Nursery School and continued their engagement at TIC through high school with each serving as president of the TIC USY Chapter. Diana is currently a senior at Colgate University and expects to graduate this spring with a dual degree in Women’s Studies and Sociology and attend Columbia Law School in the fall. Jeremy is a sophomore at Johns Hopkins University studying Public Health and Economics. Following the example of their parents, Diana and Jeremy each served as leaders and role models to a cadre of younger children who congregate around the Costins’ lovely backyard while their families enjoyed Sandra and Dan’s seemingly boundless hospitality. For many young people in our community, the Costin tables, whether indoors or outdoors, are the image of what Shabbat looks like.
On any given Shabbat, if you walk through the doors of Temple Israel Center or attend one of its many events centered at members’ homes, you will encounter the work of Sandra Costin, whose name is synonymous with the vibrant and creative Shabbat spirit that TIC members of all ages share and enjoy together. For Sandra, building community at Temple Israel Center is central to all of her volunteer activities, whether she is organizing a speaker series or wine tasting or working with her crew to cook Shabbat dinner for her ever-growing chevre for the Eat, Pray, Learn dinner series. Sandra’s focus is bringing people together in ways that make everyone feel welcome and included, always striving to meet people wherever they are. Dedicated to all aspects of synagogue life, she also serves on the Board of Trustees, the Budget Committee, The Rabbi Gordon Tucker Fund for Jewish Learning, Thought and Culture Steering Committee, and the Nominating Committee. Sandra brings her positive attitude and can-do spirit to all her activities at Temple Israel Center. In addition to Sandra’s volunteer work at Temple Israel Center, she is also an active member of the JCC of MidWestchester Board of Directors, chairing its Legal and Security committees and enthusiastically working on many projects to help support the Jewish community in Westchester.
If anyone wonders why the legacy of the Rambam is so prominent in the Judaism of modern times, they need look no farther than Dr. Dan Costin for understanding. Since moving to White Plains in the 1990s, Dan can often be found at his office until late in the evening, ensuring that every cancer patient and their family who comes to him has not only the best and most careful treatment, but that all their questions are answered by him personally. We are always pleased when we see Dan with his gentle smile and warm demeanor. We know that when he is not in the sanctuary, it is because for his patients and their families, at his office he is a sanctuary. He seeks to alleviate not only the physical toil, but the spiritual burden that illness and treatment place on an entire family. Dan’s reputation in our area is legendary, not only in our community, but for people of every background who place their very lives in his capable hands. Our community could have no better role model than we find in Dan of Judaism’s unswerving commitment to ensuring that our highest values are not merely words that we speak, but sacrifices that we make: to science, to society’s highest values, and, most of all, to other people whose infinite value we honor by the quality of our dedication and our actions.
Both Sandra and Dan have recently been honored by the Westchester Jewish community, with Dan receiving the Making Miracles Happen Hadassah Award in 2014 and Sandra receiving the Westchester Jewish Council Julian Bernstein Distinguished Service award in 2017. We are grateful to them for accepting this honor from us and affording the Temple Israel Center community the opportunity to celebrate not only their contributions as dedicated congregants and role models, but also affording us this chance to appreciate the many ways they have helped our community, and each of us personally, to grow in the 23 years since they joined TIC.
Sandra and Dan and the entire Costin family express their appreciation for the dedication of our inspiring clergy, devoted lay leaders and volunteers, and outstanding staff of Temple Israel Center for all that they do to create a welcoming Jewish community that is rich in study, prayer, friendship, and acts of lovingkindness.
Young Leadership Award
Bree and Ian joined Temple Israel Center in 2013, when they moved to Harrison from the Upper West Side. Their daughter, Zoe, was then in the TIC Nursery School; their son, Abe, was then in kindergarten at Schechter Westchester. Since then, TIC has become a second home to their family. They love spending Shabbatot and haggim at the shul. So much so that they are frequently among the last to leave. And they’re working on arriving earlier too.
Not long after joining the shul, Bree began sitting on committees and planning events. Bree currently sits on the Board of Trustees, the Catering Committee, the Membership Committee, and the Nominating Committee. She is also a member of the Hesed Circle. She was a co-chair of the Gala in 2016 and 2017. In 2018, she was a Fundraising Chair for The Rabbi Gordon Tucker Fund for Jewish Learning, Thought and Culture, and she is now on the Steering Committee for the Fund.
Bree has also been an active volunteer at Schechter Westchester. Among other things, she has been a co-chair of Schechter’s gala for the last two years. Before moving to Westchester, Bree served two terms as PTA president at the Chabad Early Learning Center in Manhattan.
In addition to her committee work, Bree has one feat of physical strength to her credit: In 2018, Bree became the first woman in memory—if not history—to perform Hagbah at a TIC Days of Awe service. Ian proudly dressed Bree’s Torah.
Ian was a member of the Rabbi Search Committee that recruited incoming Senior Rabbi Annie Tucker to TIC. He was the Music Chair for the Gala in 2017 and 2018, bringing Soulfarm to the community (and dancing through the nights). And in 2018, Ian revived the dormant TIC Blood Drive with sponsorship from Brotherhood and Sisterhood, almost doubling the yield from TIC’s last drive. Ian has also supported Bree’s many volunteer activities, providing counsel, encouragement, and elbow grease.
Bree and Ian met during law school orientation. Until Abe arrived, Bree was an assistant district attorney in the New York County District Attorney’s office, practicing in both trial and appellate bureaus. She later worked at Ramah Nyack. Ian is a litigation partner at Boies Schiller Flexner LLP, specializing in complex business disputes. Ian has also maintained an active pro bono practice. In 2015, the Innocence Project honored Ian with its Advocate for Justice award for his wrongful conviction work. He is equally proud of having obtained a $1 million settlement on behalf of two minor victims of sexual abuse; he is a trustee of the trust for their health, education, and welfare that the settlement funded.
Bree and Ian are gratified to receive this honor and grateful to everyone who has worked to make this celebration a success. They feel blessed to have innumerable role models—clergy, lay, and professional—within the congregation. These people, including the Costins, never stop thinking about what they can give to the shul community, the local community, and the global community. Bree and Ian aspire to be like them.