# Welcome to the Digital Home of Ari Y Kelman # **Status** I am the [Jim Joseph Professor of Education and Jewish Studies](https://ed.stanford.edu/faculty/aykelman) in the Stanford University [Graduate School of Education](https://ed.stanford.edu/). My research focuses on the intersections of religion and education, both institutional and extra-institutional. On campus, I also hang out [here](https://jewishstudies.stanford.edu/) and [here](https://religiousstudies.stanford.edu/) **Big Questions** Most of my attention is oriented toward understanding how religiously identified communities create, manage, share, codify, manipulate, and transmit the knowledge they hold dear. - Sometimes this means looking closely at religious media. - Sometimes this means studying how people learn to hold religious commitments. - Sometimes this means examining how religious communities advance or invest in specific ideas or bodies of knowledge. - Sometimes I describe myself as a "sociologist of religious knowledge." **Applied Knowledge** I also work with (mostly) Jewish organizations looking to increase their educational impact by deepening their understanding of where and how their efforts are making a difference.