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David J. Steiner
David J. Steiner
Born	David Jay Steiner (1965-02-02)February 2, 1965 Chicago, Illinois, United States
Died	December 26, 2016(2016-12-26) (aged 51) Iganga, Uganda
Cause of death	bus accident
Alma mater	UCLA, National Louis University
Occupation(s)	Film director, film producer, educator, political activist, rabbi, real estate investor, mediator

David J. Steiner (born February 2, 1965) was an American documentary filmmaker, educator, rabbi, real estate investor, mediator and political activist, best known for the documentary film Saving Barbara Sizemore (2016).

Early life

David Jay Steiner was born in Chicago, Illinois to a Jewish family, and was raised in nearby Lincolnwood, Illinois. His parents, Robinn Schulman, a nurse whose family owned the company that manufactured Shane Toothpaste (now known as AloeSense), and Joseph Steiner, a figurative painter and art instructor, divorced when he was young, but maintained an amicable relationship. As a youth, he began a lifelong affiliation with Habonim Dror, the labor Zionist youth movement, and attended their summer camps in Michigan and California. His experiences at these summer camps helped shape his political activism. Steiner loved baseball, and was an avid Chicago Cubs fan throughout the entirety of his life. As an adult, he would attend baseball games whenever and wherever possible, and share his love of the game with his own children, frequently taking them on overnight car trips to major and minor league baseball games through out North America.

Education

Steiner was educated in Lincolnwood Public Schools until his sophomore year of high school, when unaccompanied by his family, he moved to Israel. In accord with his socialist values, he lived in the kibbutz community of Hakfar Hayarok. On the kibbutz, Steiner was assigned to the dairy, and was put in charge of the artificial insemination and midwifery process for cows. For the rest of his life, Steiner would incorporate bovine imagery into his work; he really loved cows. Steiner served in the Israel Defense Forces and fought in the 1982 Lebanon conflict, where he saw hostilities that made a profound effect upon him. This experience helped him reaffirm his feelings about peace, which would serve him well later in life as he became a peace educator.

Steiner attended the University of Illinois-Chicago (UIC), and then the University of California Los Angeles (UCLA) where he studied film, and, taking after his father, painting. As a painter, he was devoted to the styles of expressionist painters such as Alice Neel and Ernst Ludwig Kirchner, as well as his father. He continued and further developed his political activism while living in Los Angeles and as a film student, took the actor and political activist Edward Asner his mentor. The two remained close friends throughout Steiner's life.

As and adult and while in his late 40's, Steiner completed his doctorate in education at the National Louis University in Skokie, Illinois. Steiner undertook rabbinical studies at the Shalom Hartman Institute, the Hebrew Seminary of the Deaf and the International Institute for Secular Humanistic Judaism. On November 7, 2017, he was posthumously ordained a rabbi by the International Institute for Secular Humanistic Judaism at a ceremony in Farmington Hills, Michigan. (Video on YouTube)

Career

After earning his art degree at UCLA, Steiner returned to Chicago and soon thereafter moved back to Israel, where he married and had three children: Maya, Sahar and Itamar. He continued his creative efforts in Israel, developing CD-ROM and video content for a multimedia company, Hed Arzi Music, and teaching. Steiner strongly believed that the best way to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict was to find ways to get Israeli and Palestinian youth together to create art, play sports and have constructive dialog, so he started an organization that brought together Israeli and Palestinian youth. It was at this time that Steiner's son, Itamar, befriended some refugees from South Sudan, which formed the inspiration for the documentary Steiner was working on at the time of his death in Africa in 2016.

Upon his return from Israel, Steiner and his family settled in Skokie, Illinois, where Steiner tackled many projects simultaneously. He created educational software products, and invested in residential real estate. Several of his properties were located in the Humboldt Park neighborhood of Chicago, where Steiner started a book club for homeless individuals in that area. During this time, Steiner also served as director of the religious school at Congregation Solel in Highland Park, Illinois, and completed his doctoral degree in education at National Louis University. Steiner also wrote a number of screenplays at this time.

However, becoming a rabbi was important to Steiner, and he was given the opportunity to study at the Shalom Hartman Institute in Jerusalem, so the family returned to Israel. The return was short-lived, as the economic crisis of 2008-2009 resulted in the reduction of the endowment upon which Steiner's rabbinical program was funded. So the Steiners returned to the United States, this time to Tarzana, California, where Steiner assumed the position of director of education at Valley Beth Shalom in Encino, California.

After a year in California, Steiner returned to Chicago, as his marriage ended in divorce. Soon after though, he met Diane Kliebard, an attorney. Coincidentally, Kliebard was the daughter of Herbert Kliebard, a noted historian of education at the University of Wisconsin, who was a great influence on Steiner's academic work in the education field. Kliebard and Steiner eventually became engaged, and together, the two traveled to a number of locations where Steiner was invited to speak and lecture: Israel, Hong Kong, Cuba, London, and Bosnia, among others. During this time, Steiner resumed his rabbinical studies at the International Institute for Secular Humanistic Judaism, as well as extensive training as a mediator. Upon completion of his mediation studies, started Third Eye Mediation, his professional mediation practice.

While attending a mediation conference in Chicago, Steiner met Jonathan Speller, an administrator at the Barbara A. Sizemore Academy, an afrocentric charter school, in Chicago. Speller invited Steiner to the school for a Kwanzaa celebration; the school fascinated Steiner, and he decided to apply his film skills to teach children attending that school to make a documentary film. This became the basis for Saving Barbara Sizemore, Steiner's 2016 documentary.

Film

Saving Barbara Sizemore

Main article: Saving Barbara Sizemore

Steiner at the 2016 Capital City Black Film Festival

Steiner's documentary Saving Barbara Sizemore was released in the U.S. on August 27, 2016, at the Capital City Black Film Festival in Austin, Texas.

The film depicts story of the students, teachers and parents of the Barbara A. Sizemore Academy, a charter school in the Englewood area of Chicago. Barbara A. Sizemore Academy serves an African-American community which is economically disadvantaged and beset by violence. The film documents the school's unique methods, which rely heavily on African culture, customs and social structure.

In the fashion of noted documentary filmmaker Michael Moore's classic Roger and Me, Steiner takes a group of school kids to confront School District Superintendent Forrest Claypool and Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel about the school district's plans to shut down the school. In so doing, Steiner, who had a doctorate in education, teaches the students not only about how to operate a camera, but also how to use the power of filmmaking as a tool of political advocacy.

Uganda Project

Steiner filming in Uganda (December, 2016)

In the mid-2000's, when Steiner lived in Tel Aviv with his wife and children, his young son Itamar had befriended a pair of South Sudanese boys. After Steiner returned to the United States with his family to take an administrative position as an educational director at Valley Beth Shalom in Los Angeles, he learned that these boys were being deported, part of an overall Israeli government program to deport African refugees.

This spurred Steiner to action, and he contacted his friend and UCLA film school classmate, David Bret Egen. He and Egen decided to make a documentary film about the refugee crisis, one that would incorporate the stories of his son's South Sudanese friends into a new documentary, to be filmed in the United States, Israel and Uganda, where the South Sudanese boys were living after their removal from Israel -- away from their parents, who were living in war-torn Juba, South Sudan.

Steiner and Egen brought with them Sarah Giroux, a camera operator from Chicago, as well as two of the kids who helped make Saving Barbara Sizemore, Hayah Rasul and Terrance Dantzler. In December, 2016, they began production of the Uganda portion of the film. They also screened Steiner's first film at a Ugandan film festival. However on December 26, 2016, Steiner was killed in a bus accident, as their vehicle was hit at high speed by a reckless driver outside of Iganga, Uganda, after the crew attended a holiday party. The other members of the crew, which now included Steiner's son Itamar, escaped with non-life threatening injuries. As of November, 2017, with the film partially completed, the Steiner family and Egen have taken steps to continue and complete the film, as a tribute to Steiner and his legacy.

Year	Film	Role	Notes
2016	Saving Barbara Sizemore	None	Director, Producer: Chicago
2018	untitled Uganda Project	None	Co-Director, Co-Producer: Uganda

Writings

Steiner lecturing

David Steiner was a prolific writer of articles, blog entries, screenplays, and academic writings. His blog, titled The Radish: On The Beet with David Steiner, ran for six years (2008-2014), and in it, Steiner discussed a variety of topics related to causes that where close to him -- peace in the Middle East, the refugee crisis, Israeli politics, mediation, baseball, and more. Israel was always on the forefront of Steiner's mind, and his writings reflected his advocacy for an inclusive Jewish homeland, one built on democracy, tolerance and progressive values.

Among those who noted the passing of Steiner in December, 2016, was Ameinu, the progressive Zionist organization, who lauded Steiner for "providing thoughtful writings and event programs that fused Jewish scholarship, Israel education and social justice engagement."

Personal life

Steiner is survived by three children, Maya, Sahar and Itamar, from his marriage to Irit Revivo. After divorce, Steiner met Chicago-area attorney Diane Kliebard, who became his fiancee and life partner. At the time of his death in 2016, Steiner and Kliebard were living together in Evanston, Illinois. Steiner is buried at Memorial Park Cemetery in Skokie, [Illinois].

External Links

• David J. Steiner at IMDb
• Honorary Ordination of David J. Steiner (IISHJ)(Video)
• Official website: Saving Barbara Sizemore

{{David J. Steiner}}

Category:1965 births Category:Film directors from Illinois Category:Film directors from New York (state) Category:American Jews Category:American socialists Category:American documentary film directors Category:Living people Category:People from Lincolnwood, Illinois Category:People from Chicago Category:University of California, Los Angeles alumni Category:Writers from Chicago