Rabbi Erica Asch grew up as one of a handful of Jewish kids in the Navy town of Coronado, California.  Being part such a small minority intensified her sense of Jewish identity, which she cultivated further as a student at Oberlin College.  After graduation, she joined Teach For America and taught high school math in the Mississippi Delta, where she discovered her life’s vocation – she realized that she wanted to spend her life teaching Judaism rather than algebra.

Rabbi Erica Asch was ordained by Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion (Cincinnati) in 2008.  After ordination, Rabbi Asch worked as a community organizer with the Industrial Areas Foundation, the first rabbi to do so directly out of rabbinical school.  In 2013, after serving as a rabbi at Temple Sinai in Washington, D.C., Rabbi Asch moved to Augusta, Maine, where she currently serves as the rabbi of Temple Beth El and Assistant Director of the Center for Small Town Jewish Life.  She is active in the local community, most recently working with the Capital Area New Mainers Project to welcome immigrants and refugees to the Capital Area.  Rabbi Asch is the incoming President-Elect of the Central Conference of American Rabbis.