The personal was always political for Beatrice Weber, the former executive director of the advocacy organization YAFFED, which advocates for secular education in Haredi schools.

Weber, who left her Hasidic marriage in 2014 and joined YAFFED as executive director in 2022, is the mother of 10 children who attended Hasidic schools. Her experience helped qualify her for the role — but according to a recent post about her departure, the work often hit too close to home.

“I thought success in my career would help me overcome my trauma,” Weber wrote in a post on Facebook and Instagram on Friday. “I thought about it a lot at YAFFED, where I used my personal and professional experience to fight for the educational rights of children from the Hasidic community I left. Dealing with this issue daily kept me triggered and made rest almost impossible.”

During her tenure, YAFFED lobbied for follow-through on the Department of Education's June 2023 report that found 18 yeshivas in New York City were deficient in their secular instruction. It also fought back against legal challenges to 2022 regulations outlining rules for private school secular education. 

Weber sought to improve secular education in Hasidic schools long before her time at YAFFED: most notably, in 2019, she sued her son’s school, Yeshiva Mesivta Arugath Habosem in Williamsburg, which the city has since forced to submit a plan to improve its secular education. In 2023, the school, which the boy was supposed to attend according to his parents’ custody agreement, barred Weber’s son from attending.

The activist took over YAFFED in October 2022, after its previous executive director and founder, Naftuli Moster, left the organization. Moster is now the founder and editor in chief of Shtetl.

Now, the 51-year-old Weber is transitioning to a part-time position as a senior advisor for YAFFED.

“This is not only about leaving a job,” Weber wrote. “It is about adopting a life prioritizing rest, balance, and self-care.”

Adina Mermelstein Konikoff, who began working at YAFFED in October 2023, is the organization’s interim executive director.