Rabbi Sandy Eisenberg Sasso is the director of the Religion, Spirituality, and the Arts Initiative at IUPUI Arts and Humanities Institute. From 1977-2013 she served, along with her husband Rabbi Dennis C. Sasso, as spiritual leader of Congregation Beth-El Zedeck . In June 2013 she became Rabbi Emerita. After receiving her B.A. and M.A. from Temple University, in 1974 she was the first woman ordained from the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College. In addition to being the first woman to serve a Conservative congregation, she and her husband are the first practicing rabbinical couple in world Jewish history.

Sandy has written and lectured on women and spirituality, the discovery of the religious imagination in children., women’s leadership, and reimagining the Bible. She is the author of several nationally acclaimed books. Most notably, in 2004, Sandy received the Helen Keating Ott Award for Outstanding Contribution to Children’s Literature and, in 2012 took home the National Jewish Book Award for Best Illustrated Children’s Book for The Shemah in the Mezuzah. In 2019 she won the Glick Regional Author’s Award.

Sandy has been honored as one of the “Influential Women in Indiana” by the Indianapolis Business Journal and was featured among “Indy’s Most Influential Clergy” by NUVO News Weekly. She is the recipient of the “Sagamore of the Wabash”, the highest civilian honor awarded by the Governor of the State of Indiana and has been the recipient of Rhe Heritage Keeper’s award for: the Indiana State Museum and the Torchbearer’s Award from the Indiana Commission for Women.