Aileen Margolis Kassen

Aileen Margolis Kassen died February 26, 2016 in Boulder, Colorado. She was born January 9, 1927 in Rochester New York and moved with her parents to Shaker Hts., Ohio when she was seven. She attended Shaker public schools, Wellesley College (BA), Cornell University (MA) and Western Reserve University (PhD). She married the love of her life Julian Kassen, MD in 1949. They built a home in Shaker where she lived until moving to Colorado in 2014.

She taught in the education department at Lake Erie College, where she specialized in children’s literature. She was one of the first employees of the Office on School Monitoring and Research, the team that reported on Cleveland public schools’ progress on desegregation for the federal court. Her last job was director of the Institute of Education Renewal at John Carroll University, from which she retired in 1992. But she never left education. She audited a class first at Case Western Reserve University and then at the University of Colorado every through the fall of 2015. She served on CWRU’s Board of Advisors and endowed an annual Anthropology lecture there, as well as a Boulevard Elementary School book fund.

She was active in Cleveland’s Jewish Community Federation where she chaired the Community Relations Committee, served on the Board of Trustees, and was awarded the inaugural Gries Family Award for Community Leadership in 1997. She was also active in the National Jewish Community Relations Advisory Council and traveled to Israel many times including on several historic trips, a first Jewish delegation to Syria and Jordan, and a trip to build bridges amongst American, Israeli and Palestinian women. She was a member of the Ohio Governor’s Task Force on Domestic Violence and active on women’s issues, the civil rights movement, civil liberties and other causes.

She and Kass were married 60 years until his death in 2010. Together they raised two children, traveled extensively, going abroad 20 times to every continent except Antarctica, were season-ticket holders at the Cleveland symphony and loved the city’s museums and restaurants. She is survived by her son Michael (Shelly) of Westport, CT, her daughter Melinda (Bill) of Boulder, CO, grandchildren Diana Mehlman (Ezra), Amy and Laura Kassen, and Benjamin Goelz, great grandson Max Julian Mehlman and her cat Fitz. A memorial service will be held in Cleveland at a future date.

If you would like to make a contribution in her honor, please do so to the Cleveland Jewish Federation, 25701 Science Park Drive., Cleveland, OH 44122 or www.jewishcleveland.org/give/donate Arrangements under the direction of Crist Mortuary, Boulder, CO.