OCTOBER 13 • 2022 | 37
S
ara Kirsch wanted to
make aliyah to Israel
for career purposes.
At the time, she was teaching
high school in China and
taught high school in Korea
as well. Still, something was
missing for the Birmingham-
born teacher, who attended
Temple Israel and Tamarack
Camps growing up.
“I wanted to work in
Israeli high-tech,” Kirsch,
32, explains. Israel is a world
leader in the high-tech indus-
try. She had also previously
visited the country three
times. Kirsch says she was
drawn to the “ecosystem and
the number of opportunities
there are for native English
speakers.”
After living in Asia for five
years, Kirsch packed up her
belongings and made aliyah to
Israel in 2017. She had no job
and no real glimpse of where
she could fit into the high-
tech world.
“I had a lot of people tell
me that with just teaching
experience and with my
background, that I wouldn’t
find a job,” she recalls. Kirsch
had focused mostly on social
studies, debate, U.S. history,
economics and psychology in
teaching. “I was afraid, but I
still decided to pursue it.”
BUILDING A CAREER
Kirsch built her career in
Israeli high-tech from the
ground-up. She spent her first
five months in Haifa, com-
pleting Ulpan, an immersive
Hebrew language learning
program.
Then, she began applying
for jobs and landed a role
working in pay-per-click digi-
tal advertising, or PPC. Kirsch
accepted her first job in Tel
Aviv as a content writer at
Smartlify, a PPC digital adver-
tising agency.
“I found an industry and a
vertical that I was really tal-
ented in,” she explains. “After
about six months at my first
job, I was promoted to be a
manager. I made most of the
companies I worked for a lot
of money, and I really loved
it.”
Still, the growth didn’t come
without challenges. Navigating
the cultural change proved
difficult, since Kirsch says
Asian culture tends to be very
soft, while Israeli culture is
very direct. “I was also prob-
ably the only native English
speaker at most of my jobs,
which was good and bad.”
Kirsch lived in Israel for six
years and worked with four
Israeli companies. She also
volunteered with different
teaching and tech organiza-
tions. In just a few short years,
she quickly grew to become
one of the only American
females in a leadership posi-
tion in her industry in Tel
Aviv.
In 2020, Kirsch also
launched a blog called Israel
Meet Sara Kirsch,
who recently
returned home
to Birmingham.
Israeli
High-Tech
Leader
ASHLEY ZLATOPOLSKY
CONTRIBUTING WRITER
NEXT DOR
VOICE OF A NEW GENERATION
Sara Kirsch
speaking at the
Serling Event
Sara
Kirsch at
the Dead
Sea.
continued on page 38