Staff

Alice Johnson Cain

Executive Director

The Honorable Alice Johnson Cain is Executive Director of The Moriah Fund, as well as a former Delegate in the Maryland General Assembly. She represented Annapolis in the legislature for two Sessions, serving on the Ways and Means Committee and Education Subcommittee.

Alice brings 30+ years of policy experience to The Moriah Fund, including serving as the chief education advisor to Education and Labor Committee Chairman George Miller in the U.S. House of Representatives and as policy advisor to Senator Paul Simon. Alice was a founding member of the national committee of education experts that advised Senator Obama's 2008 presidential campaign and played a similar role advising Secretary Clinton’s 2016 campaign. She spent over a decade in the nonprofit sector, including policy and advocacy roles at the Children's Defense Fund, Teach Plus, Hope Street Group and National Institute for Literacy, all influenced by her years as a GED teacher for immigrants, refugees and low-income youth and adults.

Alice has published numerous op-eds, articles, and reports, including a report published by Fulbright New Zealand that included education policy recommendations that were adopted by the New Zealand government. As a Senior Congressional Staff Fellow with the Aspen Institute, Alice worked across the aisle to find common ground on policies to help students and families. She has served as a peer reviewer for America Achieves, Bellwether Education Partners, Carnegie Corporation of New York, Fulbright Distinguished Awards in Teaching Program, MacArthur Foundation and U.S. Department of Education.

Alice co-founded the Black Voices for Black Justice Fund (BVBJ), as well as local chapters of Everybody Wins literacy program and the Walk a Mile in Your Sister’s Shoes empathy-building initiative. Alice currently serves on the boards of BVBJ and Civics Unplugged. Her previous board service includes the Academy of Hope, Laubach Literacy / ProLiteracy Worldwide, and the Success for All Foundation.

Don Futterman

Director, Israel

Don has worked with Moriah since 2005, leading Moriah’s efforts in Israel to strengthen civil society, human rights, liberal democracy and to promote equal opportunity in education. Don has overseen Moriah’s partnership with NGOs advocating on behalf of the Ethiopian immigrant community and Palestinian citizens of Israel.

Don is also the founding Executive Director of The Israel Center for Educational Innovation (ICEI), established in 2009, the leading organization for turning around underperforming low-income elementary schools in Israel, including many with concentrations of Ethiopian-Israeli students and several in Arab communities.

Don can be heard on TLV1’s The Promised Podcast, a weekly review of politics and society in Israel, named on multiple lists as one of the leading Jewish podcasts in the world. Don has been a columnist for Haaretz and has written for The Daily Beast. Don is also the creative force behind a second podcast, Futterman’s One-Man Show, and is the author of Yaniv’s Treasure האוצר של יניב a children’s book published by Tal-Mai of Yedioth Books.

Don is married with three children and has lived in Israel since 1994.

DeAmber Jones

Program Assistant

DeAmber joined The Moriah Fund in September 2022. Prior to Moriah, she worked as a Medical Social Associate at the University of Illinois in The Division of Specialized Care for Children, supporting families of children with special health care needs requiring integrated care. She also worked as a Parent Educator at the Comprehensive Behavioral Health Center, helping teenage mothers gain basic self-sufficiency skills and other skills necessary to raise emotionally, physically, and psychologically healthy children.

As a mission-driven, intrinsically motivated individual with a strong passion for social and racial justice, as well as human rights, DeAmber recently returned to school and earned a Master of Public Administration and a graduate certificate in Nonprofit Management from the University of Illinois Springfield. She also holds a bachelor’s degree in anthropology from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. DeAmber focuses on supporting the needs of Moriah’s grantees and partners.

Gwen Tran

Grants Manager

Gwen has been with The Moriah Fund for her entire career since graduating college with a degree in Computer Networking and Management. Starting out as the Fund’s receptionist, Gwen transitioned over time to executive assistant for Mary Ann Stein before becoming our Grants Manager. Gwen’s dedication to and history with Moriah are evident in the passion she brings to ensuring our grantees are well cared for and that their needs are met quickly and efficiently – hallmarks of Moriah's commitment to its grantees.

Board of Directors

Gideon Stein

President

Gideon has served as the President of The Moriah Fund since 2019. In addition to his work with Moriah, Gideon is the Chairman of Write Label, a leading provider of AI-generated advertising for media companies, agencies, and brands.

Prior to Write Label, Gideon spent more than a decade founding and running both for-profit as well as non-profit organizations in the education space. In particular, Gideon was the Founder and CEO of LightSail Education, the adaptive reading platform that helps students, classrooms, and school districts significantly exceed their literacy goals. Prior to LightSail, Gideon co-founded and served as President of Future Is Now Schools, an organization focused on school turnarounds and union reform work. A leader in the national education landscape, Gideon serves on the board of Narrative 4 and is the Chairman of Civic News Company.

Dorothy Stein

Dorothy has enjoyed a career spanning marketing, technology and real estate. In addition, she has long been active in fund-raising and development for non-profits in Washington, DC.

In 2011, Dorothy co-chaired Mary's Center's fund-raising gala, Noche Tropical, which raised funds for medical and psychological services for disadvantaged women, men and families in the Washington, DC area. She served on the Board of Directors of Planned Parenthood of Metropolitan Washington (PPMW) from 2013-2019, and was chair of their annual fund-raising events, The Pink Ball and Cocktails For A Cause. In 2017, Dorothy teamed with PPMW's education directors to spearhead a new initiative, Pink Party, designed to educate young girls and their parents about peer relationships, communication and reproductive health.

Judith Lichtman

The president of the National Partnership for Women & Families until 2004, Judith currently serves as its senior advisor. Under Judith’s leadership, the National Partnership has been at the forefront of every major piece of civil rights legislation related to women and families for more than four decades. The National Partnership helped pass some of the most important legal protections for American women and families, including the Pregnancy Discrimination Act of 1978 and the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) of 1993. In 1996, the National Partnership helped shape key provisions of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) that make it easier for women and their families to get and keep health coverage.

President Clinton called Judith “a remarkable national treasure,” and Washingtonian magazine has identified her as one of Washington, DC’s most powerful women and Washingtonian of the Year in 1986. The Sara Lee Corporation awarded her the 1989 Frontrunner Award in the area of Humanities. That same year, the Women’s Bar Association named her Woman Lawyer of the Year. In 2000, Judith received the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights Hubert H. Humphrey Award for her contributions to the advancement of human and civil rights.

Jean Desravines

Jean serves as the Chief Executive Officer of New Leaders, a national nonprofit organization whose mission is to develop transformational, equity-minded school leaders and advance policies and practices that ensure high academic achievement for all children—especially students of color and students from communities with lower incomes. Jean has over 25 years of professional leadership. Before joining New Leaders, he held a number of leadership roles at the New York City Department of Education (NYCDOE) in the Bloomberg Administration.

Jean is a member of several boards including Houghton Mifflin Harcourt (HMH), KinderCare, America Achieves, The Moriah Fund and St. Francis College in Brooklyn. He is the co-founder of Innovation for Equity and the co-chair of the Black Voices for Black Justice Fund. Jean recently served on Mayor Adam's education transition committee with Chancellor Banks. He also served as a member of Governor Cuomo’s Education Reform Commission and was named to Forbes “Impact 30,” recognizing the world’s leading social entrepreneurs from across the country.

Jean has been featured in EdWeek, The New York Times, The 74, Inside Higher Ed, and Forbes, among others. He co-authored two books: Breakthrough Principals and The School Leadership Playbook. Jean earned a Bachelor of Arts in History from St. Francis College and a master’s degree in Public Administration from New York University.

Craig Cramer

OBSERVER

The CEO of Amplify Endowment Management, an asset management company serving charitable foundations and not-for-profit organizations, Craig has more than two decades of experience leading social sector and investment management organizations.

In the 1990’s he was the Senior Portfolio Manager at Canyon Partners, a leading hedge fund. Craig founded EMPower – The Emerging Markets Foundation, which galvanized the Wall Street emerging markets community to support local social sector organizations in the developing world. After turning over the leadership of EMPower, Craig served as a Senior Program Officer at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, where he was part of the founding team of the foundation’s Global Development program and led the Global Development program’s Special Initiatives group. Craig has also served as a board member and advisor to a number of foundations and not-for-profits in the areas of human rights, the environment, and the arts.

Mary Ann Stein

Chairwoman Emerita
(1943-2023)

The co-founder, and former President of the Moriah Fund for 35 years, Mary Ann served on the boards of Americans for Peace Now and the New Israel Fund, where she previously served as co-president and president, respectively.

Mary Ann was the co-founder of the Fund for Global Human Rights as well as the Israel Center for Educational Innovation. A graduate of Wellesley College and George Washington University Law Center, Mary Ann has chaired several committees, coalitions, and mayoral advisory commissions on family and children’s issues. She served on the D.C. Judicial Nominations Commission and has written and published papers on public assistance and child welfare.