Fleeing anti-Semitism, Shoshana Pakciarz’s parents, Feivel and Leah Rivka (née Leibman) Pakciarz, immigrated from Poland to Argentina in 1928. There, they met, married, and settled in the provincial capital of Salta in the northwest, where they ran a grocery store. Shoshana was born on February 9, 1943, one of four children: her twin David, her younger brother Baruch, and her older sister Clara.

Though Feivel and Leah Pakciarz came from Orthodox backgrounds, they were secular Jews and Zionists. In 1964, when Shoshana was 21, the family made aliyah (immigrated to Israel) and settled on Kibbutz Mefalsim in the northwestern Negev near the Gaza Strip. The kibbutz was founded in 1949 by immigrants from Argentina and Uruguay who were members of what would become Habonim Dror, a progressive Labor Zionist cultural youth movement that promotes social justice and coexistence and whose core tenets include Tikkun Olam, working to repair the world.

On the kibbutz, Shoshana’s father worked as a bookkeeper and her mother as a seamstress and a knitter. Shoshana worked with young people. David worked as a veterinary immunologist, Baruch as a designer and manufacturer, and Clara as regional educator. 

A native Spanish speaker, Shoshana learned Hebrew in Argentina through the forerunner of Habonim Dror in Argentina, in day-to-day life in Israel, and in Jerusalem at the Hebrew University ulpan, an intensive language program for immigrants. She studied at Tel Aviv University from 1966 to 1969. During this time, she worked with Israel’s National Agency for Youth, where she developed and implemented a national curriculum for adolescent after-school activities and edited a Spanish-language social policy quarterly. From 1970 to 1971, she created programs designed to foster understanding between Israeli and Latin American youth.

Pakciarz moved to Boston in 1971. Despite her limited command of English, she convinced her University of Massachusetts-Boston academic advisor to waive courses in English as a Second Language so she could enroll directly in standard coursework. Taking a heavy course load, she completed her bachelor’s degree in a little over a year. In 1973, she graduated summa cum laude with a double major in psychology (with distinction) and theater arts. She earned a master’s degree from the Harvard Graduate School of Education in 1979.

Pakciarz became a United States citizen in 1981 and legally changed her name from Susana, as she had been known in Argentina, to Shoshana, as she was called in Israel.

In 1973, Pakciarz began her public service career as a community representative for the Massachusetts Office for Children, serving the cities of Everett, Malden, and Medford. She helped residents become advocates for children’s services by identifying service gaps, developing community-based programs, and training people to present testimony at the State House. She was later promoted to a regional director position.

Pakciarz joined the United Way of Massachusetts Bay in 1980, steadily taking on increasing leadership responsibilities over the course of her seven-year tenure. There she led strategic planning groups to redesign how the organization allocated nonprofit funding. These staff and senior-volunteer-led groups were instrumental in resetting United Way’s community program priorities to better meet the evolving needs of Greater Boston. Pakciarz oversaw the distribution of more than $8 million annually to 30–35 agencies. She also coordinated 15–20 volunteers to evaluate each agency’s programs, administration, and finances and assessed all funding applications.

In 1987, Pakciarz became executive director of Project Bread, a Boston-based nonprofit dedicated to combating hunger in Massachusetts. Project Bread supports programs and initiatives that connect individuals and communities to reliable food sources and advocates for policies that alleviate hunger. It is best known for its signature fundraiser, the Walk for Hunger. The first pledge walk in the United States, the Walk for Hunger was founded in 1969 by Patrick Hughes and Paulist Center activists.

Both a visionary and a pragmatic leader, Pakciarz could think strategically, tactically, and operationally. She believed that good ideas alone were not enough—effectiveness required focus. “Anyone can be right, but not everyone can be effective,” she often told her staff. Accordingly, one of her first initiatives was a statewide study of childhood hunger. The study produced a focused set of recommendations, laying the groundwork for Project Bread’s programs and advocacy efforts.

Pakciarz knew how to engage people and turn them into stakeholders. She sought input from community groups, beneficiaries, and experts alike. Her team divided the state into regions, established organizing committees, and hosted well-attended legislative breakfasts to engage lawmakers. She also spearheaded annual budget campaigns that mobilized constituents to contact their legislators, while she herself walked the halls of the State House.

Pakciarz recruited individual, corporate, and media sponsors and forged partnerships with food pantries, meal programs, Catholic Charities, and the Episcopal Diocese. Internally, she built team spirit by organizing events for staff and volunteers. Forward-thinking and meticulous, she urged staff to plan for every outcome and to aim higher. “I don’t want you to do the best you can do,” she often said. “I want you to do the best that can be done.” Each year, she challenged herself and others to reach new heights: more walkers, more sponsors, and greater public awareness.

Under Pakciarz’s leadership, Project Bread expanded dramatically. Building on her predecessors’ work, she grew the Walk for Hunger into one of the largest single-day fundraising events in the country. In 1995, her final year, the event drew more than 46,000 participants and raised $3 million.

Pakciarz’s work at Project Bread had a significant impact on state policy. Massachusetts became one of the few states to provide full funding for the Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) Program, a supplemental nutrition and education program for pregnant and postpartum women, infants, and children up to age five.

Pakciarz was a passionate lover of the arts. In 1989, filmmaker Michal Goldman founded the first Boston Jewish Film Festival (BJFF; now Boston Jewish Film). The BJFF immediately attracted large, enthusiastic audiences who welcomed the chance to see films on Jewish themes and themselves authentically represented on screen. In 1992, Pakciarz was instrumental in establishing a BJFF board of directors and soon after became its president. 

Over Pakciarz’s decade-long tenure, the BJFF experienced significant growth. It expanded to support full-time, year-round staff; offered extensive year-round programming; and formed partnerships with other festivals. The BJFF became an internationally recognized and award-winning organization, due in part to Pakciarz’s unwavering advocacy and her insistence on maintaining the festival’s artistic integrity. She applied strategic thinking and discipline to fundraising and led a strategic planning effort.

In 2000, Pakciarz and Pnina Blayer, artistic director of the Haifa International Film Festival, created the Boston–Haifa Film Connection under the auspices of the Boston–Haifa Connection, Combined Jewish Philanthropy’s partnership with Haifa. Through films, guest artists, and discussions, the Film Connection explored Jewish identity and fostered mutual understanding between the sister cities.

Pakciarz was also involved in the conception of a broader Jewish arts and cultural initiative. From 2000 to 2005, she served as the first executive director of the New Center for Arts & Culture (now the Jewish Arts Collaborative), in partnership with the Jewish Community Centers of Greater Boston and Combined Jewish Philanthropies. The New Center for Arts & Culture’s debut took place in the spring of 2003 with Words on Fire, an eight-week citywide collaborative program commemorating the 70th anniversary of the Nazi book burning in Berlin. It featured exhibits, discussions, films, and appearances by writers John Updike and Alice Hoffman and playwright Tony Kushner. Words on Fire supporters included the Boston Public Library (BPL), the Museum of Fine Arts Boston, and Facing History and Ourselves. The BPL displayed Writer’s Block, a sculpture by artist Sheryl Oring featuring hundreds of pre-World War II European typewriters trapped in steel cages—a haunting symbol of censorship.

In 2005, the New Center for Arts & Culture brought The Power of Conversation, an exhibition from New York City’s Jewish Museum, to Boston College’s McMullen Museum. The exhibit explored how Jewish women and their salons shaped cultural development in Europe and America from the late eighteenth century through World War II.

Over the years, Pakciarz served on numerous non-profit social service and arts organizations’ boards of directors, steering committees, and councils, including Greater Boston Legal Services, Interfaith Assembly on Homelessness and Housing, Massachusetts Anti-Hunger Coalition, and City of Boston Hunger Commission. Jewish organizations included the New England Council New Israel Fund, CJP’s Boston-Haifa Connection, and the Jewish Community Relations Council. From 2008 to 2017, Pakciarz served on the board of the Global Health Committee, Inc. (also operating as Cambodian Health Committee), dedicated to improving the health and well-being of people suffering from tuberculosis, HIV/AIDS, and poverty.

Pakciarz’s contributions to both human services and the arts earned recognition from numerous organizations. Her honors include the Sanctity of Life Award from Brandeis University and the YWCA’s Extraordinary Women of Achievement Award.

In 1974, Pakciarz married Leonard (Lenny) W. Gruenberg, a physicist who left academia to do pioneering work in the economics of long-term care, and became a supportive stepmother to Lenny’s son Aaron.

Shoshana and Lenny traveled often to Israel to visit her extended family. The Israeli relatives were welcome and frequent guests in their Cambridge home, where Shoshana always kept winter clothes on hand for them. Shoshana and Lenny were known for their generosity, warm hospitality, and especially their popular Yom Kippur break fasts and Passover Seders.

Year in and year out, Pakciarz and her husband could be found in their favorite seats at Boston Jewish Film Festival screenings, continuing to support the cultural community she had helped to shape.

Shoshana Pakciarz died on May 19, 2024.