Barbara Marcy Borts was born in Los Angeles, California. She is a rabbi in the Movement for Reform Judaism in the UK. In 1981, she was the third woman in Europe to receive the semikhah of rabbinic ordination from Leo Baeck College in London. In 1984 she was the first woman to have her own bimah in a British Reform synagogue. Since then, she has worked for several communities in England, the US and Canada. She has developed programmes for Jewish learning, liturgy and alternative forms of prayer.