Duquesne cybersecurity analyst chosen for Hadassah Evolve Leadership Fellowship

Pittsburgh’s Ellie Greenwald has been chosen as a 2026 Evolve Leadership Fellow with Hadassah. This marks the fourth year Hadassah has selected a class of Jewish women representing its values of supporting Israel, health care, advocacy and youth development, and Greenwald is among a diverse cohort of women in their 20s, 30s and 40s, ranging from health care professionals to full-time homemakers.

Greenwald is a cybersecurity analyst focusing on compliance and auditing for Duquesne Light Company and leads the Pittsburgh branch of Evolve Hadassah: The Next Generation, a development group for younger women. She originally heard about the fellowship at the 2025 Midwest Chicago conference Hadassah puts on every year and felt her drive to serve the Jewish community aligned with its values.

“I was inspired by the strength, vision and leadership of Hadassah and the Evolve members,” Greenwald said.

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As someone with C-PTSD (Complex Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder) who has experienced a number of traumas, Greenwald is committed to helping others cope with trauma.

“I want to take this personal growth, learning and experience to build a supportive and engaging Evolve community in Pittsburgh [through which] other women can find connection and support regardless of their life phase,” she said.

“We all have our purpose in the world. Mine has to do with trauma and heartache … and providing support to those who don’t know how to ask for help. Hadassah provides every kind of practical and psychological support to the residents of its Youth Alliyah villages. I look forward to learning more about that when I visit for the first time on the Evolve Leadership Fellows trip to Israel in March.”

The two youth villages in Israel that Hadassah sponsors are home to vulnerable Israeli students from all backgrounds — Jews, Druze, Muslims, Ethiopians, Russians, Bedouins — and from places in the world where it’s no longer safe to be Jewish. In addition to a community, a home, an education and wraparound support services, Hadassah offers programming of all kinds, like audio workshops, animal therapy, pre-army preparation, carpentry and vocational training. During wartime, youth villages like Hadassah Neurim and Meir Shfeyah are an important resource for giving young people the tools to cope with the violence around them.

At a time when many Jewish organizations struggle to connect with the Gen Z and millennial demographic, programs like Hadassah’s Evolve: The Next Generation, of which the Evolve Leadership Fellows program is part, are both a way for younger Jewish women to connect with each other and to connect to the culture more broadly.

“As an Evolve Leadership Fellow,” Greenwald said, “it will be my responsibility to spread the word about Hadassah’s mission and to support it financially, to advocate in the U.S. for Israel and for women, and to create connections and community in Pittsburgh through activities that build connections and inspire women to be their best selves.”

Greenwald is also an advocate for women in the workforce through the Professional Women’s Network, a Pittsburgh-based organization that helps women thrive both personally and professionally. Women make up only 22% of the cybersecurity workforce, so Greenwald has direct experience of being in a male-dominated industry. She stays up to date on national conversations about her field, and makes sure the Duquesne Light Company is consistent with best practices through her involvement with two national governing bodies around cybersecurity and energy, ISACA (Information Systems Audit and Control Association) and EUCI, and taking compliance courses through the latter.

Carol Ann Schwartz, Hadassah national president, expressed excitement about the new class of fellows, saying that she was “delighted to see younger Jewish women eager to take up the mantle of leadership to help advance Hadassah’s mission.”

In the next year, Greenwald and her peers will meet with Hadassah leadership to discuss how they can best serve their community through the fellowship. In the second year of the fellowship, fellows pair up with a Hadassah mentor and take on a leadership position in their local Hadassah chapter — in Greenwald’s case, that will be Hadassah of Greater Pittsburgh.PJC

Emma Riva is a freelance writer living in Pittsburgh.