News & Blogs Category: Partners in the News

The Rosalinde and Arthur Gilbert Foundation of Los Angeles has awarded the Berkeley Institute for Jewish Law and Israel Studies at UC Berkeley a $1 million matching grant toward the institute’s goal of building a $10 million endowment by 2024.

According to the Jan. 23 announcement of the grant, the Berkeley Institute’s endowment campaign has also received grants totaling nearly $2 million from the Koret Foundation and the Jim Joseph Foundation. 

“We’re issuing a challenge to other funders who care about proven campus models for engaging students around the study of Israel and Jewish identity in the modern world,”  Gilbert Foundation trustee Martin Blank Jr. said in the announcement. “This is an exciting endeavor, and we hope others join us in this cause.” 

The Berkeley Institute houses two programs: the Berkeley Program on Israel Studies and the Berkeley Program on Jewish Law, Thought and Identity. 

The institute, which was launched in 2011 and has a faculty of 22 members hailing from a variety of academic disciplines, allows students to integrate Israel studies throughout different campus departments, courses and programs; and to complement Jewish studies’ traditional focus on history and literature with a range of classes engaging Judaism from different vantage points. 

The Rosalinde and Arthur Gilbert Foundation supports a variety of academic programs at UC Berkeley and UCLA, including a monthly colloquium at the Berkeley Institute for presentations and discussions related to Israel and Judaism.

Dawne Bear Novicoff, chief operating officer of the Jim Joseph Foundation, said the Berkeley Institute has transformed the possibilities for Israel study at UC Berkeley.

“The strong desire for rigorous academic engagement with Israel at Berkeley is undisputed now,” Novicoff said. “Each year, the Institute offers even more to students, contributing to an Israel studies landscape that is completely transformed compared to what it was seven years ago. With its proven model, the Institute can work to ensure its future viability and long-term impact.”

Source: Jewish Journal of Greater Los Angeles

Rabbi Jacqueline Mates-Muchin was in college when someone asked her boyfriend (and now husband) how he would deal with an interfaith marriage. Both partners in the relationship were Jewish, but the questioner made the assumption she was not because she is Asian.

“And that was hurtful,” said Mates-Muchin, the senior rabbi at Oakland’s Temple Sinai since 2015 and the first Chinese American rabbi. “When people focus on how you look, I think that discounts who I am and my knowledge and my feeling of belonging.”

Ilana Kaufman started the Jews of Color Field Building Initiative to train the next generation of leaders. (Photo/Michael Fox)

Jews of color, who make up an ever-increasing slice of the American Jewish population, deal with overt and subtle prejudice on a regular basis.

They are made to feel like outsiders at High Holiday services. They are bombarded with quizzical stares and questions at synagogues. They are underrepresented in leadership roles at mainstream Jewish institutions, from JCCs and Federations to philanthropic organizations.

“Racism has not allowed the Jewish community to understand ourselves as multiracial,” said Ilana Kaufman, who launched the Jews of Color Field Building Initiative last August to address some of the inequities.

“We’ve done an amazing job of excising Jews of color out of the narrative. We’re trained to think they are not Jewish,” said Kaufman, who is preparing for her daughter’s bat mitzvah in April at Congregation Beth El in Berkeley.

Kaufman’s organization is committed to preparing a new generation to step into those Jewish leadership roles throughout the community. It’s the early stages of an effort to make sure Jews of color are represented in ways that reflect their growing numbers, not just in the Bay Area but also nationwide.

The Bay Area-centered organization uses its Facebook page to promote and support the work of Jews of color, such as a Feb. 13 talk at Temple Sinai by Mates-Muchin titled “Chinese and Jewish.” Kaufman also runs webinars to create virtual community for Jews of color, no matter where they live.

The Field Building Initiative — which is supported by the Walter and Elise Haas Fund, the Jim Joseph Foundation, the Leichtag Foundation and the Charles and Lynn Schusterman Family Foundation — also is awarding grants to individuals and entities that are part of the new generation. The first six grants awarded last year went to groups such as Jews in All Hues and the Jewish Multiracial Network, which will use the money to help host the second national Jews of Color Convening in Massachusetts in June.

Paula Pretlow is one of the rare local examples of a Jew of color in a leadership position at a major Jewish institution. The San Francisco resident serves on the boards of San Francisco’s Congregation Emanu-El and the Harry and Jeanette Weinberg Foundation.

“I’m usually the only Jew of color in most rooms that I enter,” said Pretlow, who also serves on the boards of the Kresge Foundation, the San Francisco Symphony and Northwestern University. She believes that will change as more people of color attain prominent positions in high-profile businesses and mainstream Jewish organizations.

She said her certainty about her own sense of belonging insulates her from some of the uncomfortable stares aimed at herself and her fellow Jews of color.

Back when she lived in the East Bay, Pretlow started attending Temple Isaiah in Lafayette, where the rabbi encouraged her to come to services more often. “So I came and sat in the back, and then I challenged myself to move a little farther forward. I didn’t know how I would be accepted. Then I joined a b’nai mitzvah class, so I very quickly found my people. If people thought I didn’t belong there, they never had the guts to say it to me.”

Tonda Case of Oakland, a national board member of the Jewish social justice group Bend the Arc, said she still gets looks that say “What are you doing here?” when she attends Shabbat services while traveling.

“Then comes the question, ‘Oh, are you Jewish? How are you Jewish?’” said Case, who sent both of her daughters to Oakland Hebrew Day School. “Because Jewish looks like white Ashkenazi Jewish to people. The thing is, that’s not what Jewish means. I am not white, I am not Ashkenazi — so am I not Jewish? Am I an interloper? Do I have to depend on your kindness to be able to walk in the door and join Shabbat services? I say, ‘Absolutely not.’”

Despite those challenges, Kaufman said she sees signs of some changing attitudes, in part simply because there are so many more Jews of color today. Intermarriage has increased in recent decades, and along with it the percentage of non-white Jews.

The 2018 Portrait of Bay Area Jewish Life commissioned by the S.F.-based Jewish Community Federation found that 25 percent of local Jewish households include a person who is not white. Among 18- to 34-year-olds, 38 percent of households include a person of color.

The next step in gaining greater acceptance and visibility, Kaufman said, is to get a better idea of how many people identify as Jews of color across the country. She has commissioned such a national survey, to be completed this spring.

A 2015 demographic study by the Steinhardt Social Research Institute at Brandeis University estimated that 11.2 percent of the nation’s 7.16 million Jews were non-white (compared with 35 percent of the general U.S. population).

Kaufman expects there to be a higher percentage of Jews of color in her survey. She points to a recent talk she gave in Phoenix, where she asked the primarily white, Modern Orthodox congregants how many people knew a Jew of color. Many who raised their hands said they had Jewish grandchildren who were not white.

The survey results will allow the Jews of Color Field Building Initiative to push for more leadership roles for Jews of color.

“It is our job to change the paradigm, and the survey will help that happen,” Kaufman said. “Let’s say the survey finds 20 percent are Jews of color — then I’ll tell organizations, I want you to leave 20 percent of your boardroom empty until you can find people of color.”

Case, of Bend the Arc, said when she’s the only Jew of color at a meeting, she thinks about the richness that group is missing.

“As our numbers grow, as the demographics change, it’s really important that [Jewish] leadership changes to reflect that,” Case said. “Otherwise, we are at a disadvantage. In this country and around the world, we have seen what that looks like when people [of color] are not at the table.”

Mates-Muchin said she’s seen progress in synagogues welcoming Jews of color since she was ordained 17 years ago, but that much work remains.

“I think we just have to be open to challenging ourselves and our assumptions, and sometimes recognizing we’re wrong. To be really reflective of who we are and how we might be able to broaden our understanding of who our community is,” she said, “especially when it comes to [our] diversity. We need to be more open about what that means, and the way we talk about things has to be more reflective of the people we are.”

Kaufman said Judaism has to be willing to bend its “Ashkenormative” standards to incorporate more multicultural ideas.

“What do our rabbinical schools need to think about? How do you apply Torah in a multiracial way?” she asked. “Then we start to rethink clergy training school. Then we start to rethink what curriculum looks like in religious schools. We need to make that shift.”

One of the groups Kaufman and others focus on is teenage Jews of color, who often struggle with dueling identities and feelings of not being fully accepted — either by Jews or by people of color. In November, more than a dozen such teens met to share stories and discuss the challenges of being a Jew of color.

One of the workshop leaders was Lindsey Newman, a project manager at S.F.-based Be’chol Lashon, which supports Jews of color as part of its mission of advocating for racial, ethnic and cultural diversity. Be’chol Lashon runs a multicultural Jewish camp each summer at Walker Creek Ranch in West Marin.

Newman said changing demographics and cultural assumptions should allow younger Jews of color to be more comfortable in their own skin than their elders.

“Jews have always been diverse, have always been a multicultural people. I see that as part of our inherent identity and one of our strengths,” Newman said. “But I think in 21st-century America, young Jews — whether they are of color or not — are growing up in a more multicultural world.

“They’re coming to expect that their world will embrace differences in a way that maybe was not true for older generations. For Judaism to be able to stay relevant, we have to celebrate differences that exist, and embrace them.”

Source: “Jews of Color Stake Their Claim to Mainstream Leadership Roles,” Rob Gloster J – The Jewish News of Northern California, January 25, 2019

CASJE (The Consortium for Applied Studies in Jewish Education) has announced three grants for research projects focused on the practice of Jewish education. The grants, up to $30,000 each, were selected from proposals submitted in response to an open call. The winning projects cover different age groups and settings of Jewish education, will be completed by the end of 2019, and will be shared broadly with the field.

The grant recipients and their projects are:

~Dr. Lauren Applebaum, Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion; Anna Hartman, Jewish United Fund of Metropolitan Chicago; and Dr. Sivan Zakai, Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion

Exploring How Preschool Children (3-4 years old) in Jewish Early Childhood Settings Think about Israel

While much communal attention is focused on how teens and young adults think about Israel, this study will address the very youngest learners in the Jewish community, asking “How do preschool children think about and understand Israel?” As this question is crucial for both scholarship and practice, this project is designed as a unique and powerful practitioner and researcher partnership. Researchers will create a developmentally-appropriate research protocol using group interviews, elicitation/provocation exercises, and teacher documentation. Early childhood practitioners from three Jewish early childhood centers will be trained to use it to uncover the ways that their students think about Israel. Multiple rounds of coding and analysis will allow both practitioners and researchers to shape and reflect on the analysis before findings are shared in both practitioner and scholarly venues.

~Dr. Sarah Benor, Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion; Dr. Netta Avineri, Middlebury Institute of International Studies; and Rabbi Nicki Greninger Director of Education, Temple Isaiah (Lafayette, CA)

Hebrew Education in Supplementary Schools

This study will investigate how Hebrew is taught and perceived at American Jewish supplementary schools. Which types of Hebrew (Liturgical, Biblical, Modern) and which skills (decoding, recitation, conversation) are emphasized? Phase one is a survey of 250+ school directors around the United States, focusing on rationales, goals, teaching methods, curricula, and teacher selection. Phase two involves classroom observations and stakeholder surveys at 10 schools with diverse approaches. Researchers will first determine how teachers teach, use, and discuss Hebrew and how students respond. Researchers will then survey students, parents, clergy, and teachers about their rationales, goals, and perceptions of their program. This project represents a collaboration among researchers and practitioners committed to theorizing how Hebrew is and might be approached in American Jewish educational institutions. Understanding this will enable future interventions to better align goals and methods among educators, congregations, and families, thereby strengthening diaspora Hebrew education.

~Dr. Bethamie Horowitz, New York University; and Joshua Krug and Amanda Winer, Ph.D. Students in Education and Jewish Studies, New York University

What are the Terms of Engagement? Israel-based Gap Year Programs as Sites for Investigating Israel Education for North American Jews

Israel-based programs for North American Jews in their gap year between high school and college are a significant locale for Israel education, but one that has not received much scholarly attention. Because the programs are situated in contemporary Israel for a period of 9 months,they function as sites of Israel education in ways that are hard to replicate in North American settings. This project will investigate the educational conceptions of two such programs –  The Young Judea Year Course, and the Kivunim Program – with particular attention to their formulations of how and why young American Jews are expected to relate to current day Israel, and how these ideas play out in practice. At a time when there are many questions about the nature of the relationship between American Jews and Israel, this inquiry will provide a window for examining educators’ views about what 21st century “Jewish citizenship” could or should entail for the rising generation of North American Jews.

Upon completing the research, grantees will share their findings with the broader field of Jewish education at conferences, via social media, and in publications.

CASJE is a community of researchers, practitioners, and philanthropic leaders committed to sharing knowledge to improve Jewish education.

Source: eJewishPhilanthropy

JumpSpark, the new community initiative to engage teens in Jewish life has a new ally – parents. 

JumpSpark, the new community initiative to engage teens in Jewish life has a new ally – parents.  The program, which begins its second year of programming this month, has discovered that parents want to better understand the wants and needs of their teenagers.

Kelly Cohen, who heads JumpSpark in Atlanta, described a series called Navigating Parenthood as an important part in connecting not just with parents, but with teens, as well.

“I think that when we are serving the parents of our community, we are serving the teens of our community, and I think that has been a great learning experience.”

Specifically, she pointed to the success of a program in August at the Marcus JCC about anxiety in teens. It was not only a dialogue between teens and a trained facilitator, but included separate conversations about the issue with the more than 140 parents and community professionals who participated.

“When you see over a hundred parents saying this is something that I want to come out to, then you know you are tapping into a real need in the community. And I would say, consistently, through the Navigating Parenthood series, this kind of participation has helped us to feel that we are really onto something,” Cohen said.

The idea of reaching out to parents as well as to teens originated in a conversation Cohen had with a parent who was looking for help that was hard to find in the community.  There was plenty of help available for parents to get together with other new parents of infants to discuss the needs they had, but not much when the children grew up, she said.

“The stakes are a lot higher with teenagers, and this parent was really looking for a way to build community with other Jewish parents of teens.”

Kelly Cohen is JumpSpark Atlanta’s Executive Director.

JumpSpark, which is supported by a collaborative of community organizations led by the Jewish Federation of Greater Atlanta, is part of a national program to increase the participation of Jewish adolescents in community life.

Last week, JumpSpark held a community seminar for parents at The Weber School on the growing problem of vaping among young people.

The seminar, with the support of the HAMSA substance abuse program of Jewish Family & Career Services and the Caron Foundation, was moved to a larger venue because of the intense parent interest in the subject.

JumpSpark Atlanta is part of national programming in 10 American cities funded by the Jim Joseph Foundation, which is among the largest supporters of Jewish educational work for children and youth.  It is named for the Jewish philanthropist who escaped the Holocaust in Austria as a child and became a successful California real estate investor. He died in 2003.

As part of a new initiative in the works, JumpSpark in Atlanta plans to expand a program making small philanthropic grants in the next year for innovative projects developed by Jewish teen organizations.

The first round of collaborative grants was awarded recently to a Jewish teen group that will partner with another Jewish teen group to create new programs.

“We want to support and raise up the professionals in our community that are already on the ground,” Cohen emphasized, “We’re here for them and the amazing work they are doing. We want to elevate and enhance that work.”

Cohen was lower school Judaic Studies coordinator of The Davis Academy for six years. Before that, she lived in Jerusalem for four years as a member of the Pardes Day School Educators Program.

She feels especially grateful for the experience of guiding a new generation of young community leaders through the JumpSpark program.

“A lot of the teens that we work with I have known for years, and I’ve watched them grow up,” she said. “I’ve been a part of their growing up. That is very meaningful to me, to really be part of someone’s Jewish journey from third grade to being a junior in high school. It’s an amazing gift to be able to touch lives at multiple ages and multiple points.”

Source: “Year Two of Important JumpSpark Programs,” Bob Bahr, Atlanta Jewish Times, December 12, 2018

Moishe House, a program for Jewish young adults that has been growing steadily throughout the United States and internationally since its inception nearly 13 years ago, is now grappling with a key question: How far should it go in providing concrete definitions and setting requirements for the content of its peer-led Jewish learning programs while still empowering its young leaders, in their 20s and early 30s, to be bold and creative in how they engage with that content?

At a “Jewish Education Summit” held Nov. 6-8 at its headquarters in The Hive at Leichtag Commons in Encinitas in northern San Diego County, Moishe House invited Jewish academics and educators to explore the extent to which its learning activities should incorporate Judaism’s core texts or ideas in order to be considered a proper Jewish education.

“We’re all asking the same question: For young adults in 2018, what does it mean to live a Jewish life? What does it mean to craft Jewish learning and own your own Jewish experience?” said Rabbi Brad Greenstein, senior director of Jewish learning at Moishe House.

Since January 2006, when it started opening Moishe Houses that support Jewish young adults who live together and host Jewish programming for their friends and community, the nonprofit organization has grown to more than 110 houses in 27 countries (including six in Los Angeles, one in Orange County and two in San Diego County), according to its website. It also provides support for leaders of peer-led retreats and a program called Moishe House Without Walls. Last  May, Moishe House said that during the previous year more than 50,000 young adult Jews were active participants in its programs, which drew a total annual attendance of more than 200,000.

“Moishe House is interesting because they are committed to democratizing Jewish education by bringing it to people’s living rooms,” said Miriam Heller Stern, national director of the School of Education and associate professor at Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion. “Anyone can teach, sit with the text and make sense of it. It’s a reflection of the American zeitgeist but comes into tension with traditional beliefs about how much one needs to know to access those texts.” 

Summit participants included representatives of educational organizations such as The Pardes Institute of Jewish Studies, the Shalom Hartman Institute and Mechon Hadar; the community-service organization Repair the World; and Moishe House funders such as the Jim Joseph Foundation and the William Davidson Foundation. (In addition to reporting on the event for the Journal, I was invited to participate in the discussions.)

We have to rethink that assumption of what education has to look like. … a formal structure to teach what used to be learned through living.
— Miriam Heller Stern

The sessions reflected diverse perspectives on Jewish education.

“Seeing spiritual homelessness and social isolation, you solve for ‘belonging,’ ” said speaker Casper ter Kuile, executive director and director of possibility for the Impact Lab at The On Being Project, and co-host of the Harry Potter and the Sacred Text podcast. Ter Kuile, who is not Jewish, brings together leaders in the emerging field of secular and sacred community innovation. He talked about unbundling and remixing traditional religious practice through several lenses. For instance, the Catholic Church used to be a full-service institution helping people to be “hatched, matched and dispatched,” he quipped, but is now experiencing a loss of popularity as people find other communities to serve their religious needs.

On the summit’s second day, Orly Michaeli, founder of the women’s spirituality retreat Wominyan, asked how Jewish educators should define “Jewish text.” Michaeli, who grew up in Guatemala, said that text is a measure of Jewish content for Judaism in the U.S., whereas in Latin America, Jewish content is derived from a sense of peoplehood centered on community and tradition. 

Stern, in her address, noted that for the last 150 years “school was synonymous with Jewish education.” Before that, she said, Jewish life was learned by living in the shtetl, where people had no choice but to live Jewishly. 

“We have to rethink that assumption of what education has to look like and be structured,” Stern said. “How do we teach the next generation to be Jewish if we don’t live in the enclave and learn by doing because everyone else was? [We need] a formal structure to teach what used to be learned through living.”

Moishe House, Stern said, was “creating little modern shtetls” that to an extent were duplicating this way of learning.

While much of the summit was involved in discussions of text and theory, Aaron Henne, founder of the Jewish theater company Theatre Dybbuk, led a session that encouraged participants’ physical movement. Groups read textual accounts of the Lilith story and then used their bodies to create “snapshots” representing the story’s narrative ideas. 

A conversation led by Yehudah Webster, director of B’nai Mitzvah Campaign, an innovative bar/bat mitzvah tutoring company in New York City, focused on where bias meets Jewish education. 

“We’re oriented in a particular norm which doesn’t allow for multiplicity of experiences,” Webster said. Educators should acknowledge that others’ Jewish experiences may be very different from their own, he added, and he challenged those present to raise the visibility of untold narratives — stories coming from Sephardic Jews, Jews of color, LGBTQ Jews, etc. — in a largely “Ashkenormative” Jewish conversation. 

Meanwhile, Greenstein said he was strategizing with Moishe House’s Resident Support team about “what it could look like for residents to create their own holistic Jewish learning plan from the very beginning of their Moishe House experience.” 

“The question I kept coming up with was ‘For what, to what end [are these learning experiences intended]?’ ” Greenstein said. “[At Moishe House] we put a lot of power and decision-making into the educators’ own hands. … The question remains, though: Is text necessary for Jewish education? Do you need a specific anchor that comes from a canonical part of the tradition to be counted as Jewish education? We learned that the realm of Torah is so expansive, but as it continues to expand we’re drawn back to that initial anchor, back to the traditional canonical texts. The question is, how do we make them come alive?”

After the summit concluded, Greenstein summed up the experience.

“We are all engaged in similar work,” he said. “We want Judaism to thrive. If Moishe House can be a catalyst for a Jewish life that’s dynamic and alive, then we’ve done our job.” 

Source: “Moishe House Explores ‘Little Shtetls’ of Jewish Learning,” Esther Kustanowitz, Jewish Journal of Greater Los Angeles, December 5, 2018

Today’s Jewish grandparents are actively building relationships with their grandchildren. Yet, programming for this generation is lacking. Enter: Jewish Grandparents Network.

Long gone are the apron-clad bubbe who slaved over matzah ball soup and the pipe-smoking zayde who watched the evening news in his Barcalounger. Today’s Jewish grandparents are tech-savvy, active seniors who FaceTime on school nights and fly into town for a weekend with their grandchildren.

According to a report last year by the U.S. Census Bureau, the number of grandparents in the United States is growing. Its population reached 69.5 million in 2014, up from 65.1 million in 2009. Baby Boomers, the youngest of whom turned 50 in 2014, have a total population of 75.4 million.

That’s a lot of grandparents, and yet, the Jewish community is lacking programming and education for Baby Boomers. The problem is nationwide, but Atlanta offers little more than annual Grandparents’ Day at day schools.

Co-founders of Jewish Grandparents Network, David Raphael of Atlanta and Lee Hendler of Baltimore, Md., seek to rectify this oversight.

“The Jewish community has done a wonderful job of supporting young families, but there is a lack of attention given to grandparents,” Raphael said. “By sharing Jewish values and narratives, the most influential members of families are grandparents.”

Flanked by Ron Wolfson (left) and Marshall Duke (right), David Raphael says Jewish grandparents are often undervalued and overlooked.

JGN launched its first program, “Grandma, Grandpa Tell Me a Story,” at The Temple Oct. 28. Ron Wolfson of American Jewish University and Marshall Duke of Emory University shared their stories with about 40 grandparents, talking about the way oral tales play a role in sustaining Jewish traditions and strengthening families.

And on Nov. 5, JGN launched the first national study of Jewish grandparents. Ten Jewish communities, including Atlanta, and five national organizations are partners in the study. It is underwritten by the JGN with support from Hendler, the Jim Joseph Foundation, The Covenant Foundation and Mike Leven.

Engaging Millennials

Grandparents are the most reliable connection to Jewish life and experiences, especially for Millennials who don’t belong to Jewish organizations or necessarily observe many rituals, Hendler said.

David Raphael, co-founder of Jewish Grandparents Network, with his granddaughter, Bina.

She attended a conference on engaging Millennials a few years ago. Frustrated at the lack of attention to Boomers, Hendler recalled talking to organizers about Jewish grandparents. “They were going to write me off. I knew the look I was getting. Nothing was going to happen. The people at table dealing with Millennials could not connect the dots. And yet, I knew from conversations that grandparents are on front lines of the change in family life.”

“Where did they have a mixed-faith wedding? My backyard. Who did they talk to about which rabbi might officiate? Me. What does the Jewish world think is going on? When it comes to the baby’s bris, does it occur to them it will be in my home and they have asked me to help them pick a mohel?”

Study after study reinforces the findings of Raphael and Hendler: Grandchildren cite the relationship with their grandparents as a major reason they identify Jewishly.

For instance, the Cohen Center for Modern Jewish Studies at Brandeis University reported in a 2015 study (“Millennial Children of Intermarriage”): “Having close ties to Jewish grandparents had a direct effect on a variety of outcomes, including identifying as Jewish by religion, celebrating Jewish holidays, feeling a connection to Israel and the Jewish people, and wanting to marry someone Jewish.”

The Cohen Center survey also states: “For all childhood experiences, Jewish grandparents should be viewed as a critical resource, and programs should be designed to leverage their influence.”

Another study of 1,150 Jewish college students, conducted in 2014 by researchers Barry Kosmin and Ariela Keysar, discovered that when grandparents accompanied the students to synagogue and other Jewish settings, they were most likely to feel strong attachments to Israel and the Jewish people.

Additionally, surveys of Birthright Israel alumni reveal that connection to Jewish grandparents is an important predictor of a wide variety of positive Jewish attitudes and practices in adulthood.

That’s because Judaism is so valued by older Jews and they pass that connection on to their grandchildren. According to the Pew Research Center Global Religious Landscape Study of 2015, more than 70 percent of Jews ages 55 and older respond that religion is either very important or important to them.

Goals of Jewish Grandparents Network

Aimed at adults from age 55 to 80, JGN plans to engage those with grandchildren of Jewish and mixed-faith families.

The JGN case study – the basis for which the organization was founded and will be funded – states grandparents are “a living bridge to the past and essential keepers and sharers of family and Jewish narratives, traditions and values.”

JGN maintains that financial support and personal time, including paying for Jewish preschool and taking grandchildren to Tot Shabbat, is the role of today’s Jewish grandparent.

By navigating the “new Jewish family” which includes multifaith, divorced, single parent and LGBTQ families, Jewish grandparents deserve meaningful dialogue and learning opportunities.

JGN is working with a research firm to gather quantitative data on family demographics, beliefs, behaviors and needs of Jewish grandparents. A sample of the survey will be distributed nationally to 1,500 members of synagogues, Jewish community centers and other Jewish organizations.

Raphael, who lives in Sandy Springs, spent his 30-year career with Hillel International creating Jewish opportunities. He values listening, collaboration and building community. “That’s how we create a Jewish community of meaning,” he said.

To take the JGN survey, visit www.grandparents.2.vu/1. JGN also maintains an active Facebook page, ww.facebook.com/groups/JewishGrandparentsNetwork.

Source: “Are Jewish Grandparents a Forgotten Population?,” Atlanta Jewish Times, Logan C. Ritchie, November 7, 2018

After the heartbreaking news of the eleven Jewish community members murdered in Pittsburg this past weekend, my work email and Facebook message boxes filled with two types of notes. White Jewish community leaders seeking advice about securing their buildings while trying to be mindful of the very real concerns expressed by Jews of Color that police and law enforcement terrorize and murder Black and Brown people, so securing Jewish community buildings with traditional law enforcement would further terrorize and put at risk Jews of Color. The other half of the notes were from Jewish community leaders who also happen to be People of Color imploring me to intervene with White Jewish leaders focused on building security while forgetting the Jewish community is multiracial thereby not considering the needs of Jews of Color. How ironic that these notes – all coming from Jewish community leaders, were similar in content but were coming from two groups of colleagues that seldom get the chance to work together and inform one another.

To bring together these colleagues in conversation, I organized an impromptu online convening and very quickly had over a dozen racially diverse Jewish community leaders gathered by video conference to openly and honestly discuss very real concerns of Jewish community safety, hear perspectives of Jews of Color as informed by the national and Jewish community context of racial injustice, and share practical suggestions about both.

We asked, how do we keep the minds, bodies and spirits of our Jewish community members and our institutions safe in ways that are reality–based, racially informed and inclusive?

Here’s what we learned:

Our leaders, colleagues and staff need professional training and skill development:

In 2013 the Steinhardt Social Research Institute American Jewish Population Project told us that 11.2% of the U.S. Jewish community is non-White. We must shift the paradigm so that when Jewish community leaders are thinking about the community – seeing in their mind’s eye – they see it as racially diverse. And, at the same time, we must build up skills and capacities, as a multiracial community, to be inclusive. And this has to include addressing issues of equity and justice, so that when tragedies occur Jews of Color are part the conversation and thinking about their specific circumstances becomes communally reflexive.

As we work to include and center the voices, experiences, perspectives and power of Jews of Color, it’s important to understand that if there are no Jews of Color present in the conversation, you’re probably missing something. In fact, it’s fairly safe to assume that if there are no Jews of Color informing your ideas, actions and policies, they will probably be imbued with a vein of racism. That’s not unique to our community, it’s simply an American reality.

Teach and train our community to navigate safety and security issues:

Hire firms who are informed, led and staffed by people of color. Certainly some are also Jewish. Prioritize vulnerable populations like children and elders. Consider training Jews of Color and other vulnerable populations in security techniques or even Krav Maga and similar skills for self-empowerment and defense. And, most critically, work to build grassroots groups for community safety. Things like watches, patrols and escorts specifically for the most vulnerable and other target populations.

Embrace, teach and celebrate defensive community postures and training – empower the community to scan perimeters, identify threats, and receive defensive training. But do so in a way that they will not be engaging in racial profiling. Instead build community/security “nets” in a way that there are not sides who might be adversarial in relationship, but rather as integrated networks of safety/advocacy/familiarity.

We need to work within our network to

1. Build inclusive relationships and trust
2. Ask how other people are doing
3. Show kindness and compassion

Jewish community organizations have the ability to deploy their unique skills using racially informed lenses. Imagine a community service organization creating racially informed approaches and programs based on racially diverse Jewish populations! We can make this the new paradigm.

After this past weekends’ shooting, I began to think about the safety of my own family at Shul. Every second of the day I worry about exposure to racial violence. And this week I worry as much about anti-Semitic violence. So much so that I had a conversation with myself about a coming family Simcha, would I hire armed guards, and would they be Black given how many non-white family and community will be in attendance. I wondered how I will keep the minds, bodies and spirits of my multiracial Jewish family and community safe.

In the afternoon on October 30th I received a note from a community relations colleague who was on the video conference earlier in the day. He said he was, “…really inspired that you so quickly and thoughtfully Zoomed such an insightful group. It was very helpful for me to hear articulated the ways that heightened security, which we’re almost certainly going to see moving forward, is making people feel less safe and what the community can do about it.” The conversation helped me too. Our leadership community is stronger now that more of us know and have had honest conversation with each other about some of the hardest issues to work through. And I am now better equipped to take care of my family, friends and community.

God willing, next time there is a Simcha at Shul, everyone in our multiracial Jewish community will be and feel safe.

Ilana Kaufman is the Director of the Jews of Color Field Building Initiative. She is a Senior Schusterman Fellow, public speaker, occasional author, strategic designer and problem solver. Ilana works with Jewish organizations and philanthropic entities navigating the intersection of Jewish community, Jewish identity and racial justice.

Source: eJewishPhilanthropy

Washington, DC – CASJE (The Consortium for Applied Studies in Jewish Education) today announced the launch of a major project supported by the William Davidson Foundation and the Jim Joseph Foundation for comprehensive research on the pipeline and “career arc” of educators working in Jewish education. The two-year project is supported by generous grants totaling $1.5 million from both foundations, and will yield findings to be shared broadly with the field of Jewish education and engagement.

“We are embarking on a timely project that promises to yield new key findings and data on critical issues that affect the work of educators in Jewish institutions and the needs of the field,” says Michael Feuer, CASJE co-chair and Dean of the Graduate School of Education and Human Development at The George Washington University, home of CASJE.

Rabbi Mitchel Malkus, CASJE co-chair and Head of the Charles E. Smith Jewish Day School, adds that “The support of the William Davidson Foundation and Jim Joseph Foundation enables CASJE to conduct this project on a national scale and to gather and analyze data about educators, where they work, and the professional preparation they receive. This data will be of significant value to the places at which these educators work. Moreover, we hope to help the field understand the needs of educators to recruit and retain the most talented people.”

Earlier this year, the William Davidson Foundation supported a CASJE-facilitated “Problem Formulation Convening” (PFC) with a group of educators and researchers, which generated high-priority research questions. The group identified challenges relating to the professional culture in many segments of the Jewish education sector, opportunities for advancement, and the condition of educator compensation. The PFC helped identify the three questions central to CASJE’s new project: 1) Entry: What does it take to launch a career in Jewish education? 2) On the Journey: Why do educators stay in this field and how do they grow? And 3) Mapping the Marketplace: Where are personnel shortages and saturation?

“Our founder, William Davidson, understood the lifelong impact Jewish education can have on an individual and a community,” says Menachem “Manny” Menchel, program officer for Jewish Education at the William Davidson Foundation. “Mr. Davidson supported various causes for many decades, including those that benefited individual Jewish day schools and communities, as well as larger opportunities to professionalize the field of Jewish education. This grant – to understand how to attract and retain the best educators – positions us to expand upon his vision.”

The research will be overseen by CASJE and will be conducted initially by Rosov Consulting in three linked studies. First, researchers will study the career plans of people currently in the settings from which Jewish educators have tended to come, such as summer camps, longer-term programs in Israel, and college fellowships. The second study will involve a comprehensive mapping of those who work in the field of Jewish education today to understand why they stay in the field and how they grow. The third component will focus on problems faced by employers and training providers coping with personnel shortages and/or saturation.

“CASJE’s unique approach combines planning strategies and research programs that reveal insights through systematic and applied research,” says Stacie Cherner, Senior Program Officer at the Jim Joseph Foundation. “Moreover, with organizations such as Leading Edge and JPRO already doing important work in many of these research areas, CASJE is positioned to deliver much-needed comprehensive quantitative and qualitative findings. Together, stakeholders in the field can then review this work to make sense of people’s experiences and choices at different stages of their careers.”

CASJE is a community of researchers, practitioners, and philanthropic leaders committed to sharing knowledge to improve Jewish education. In addition to the William Davidson Foundation and Jim Joseph Foundation, CASJE receives support from The AVI CHAI Foundation and The Crown Family, among others. The George Washington University serves as the administrative home for CASJE, enabling the specific goals of CASJE to be enriched by the academic and intellectual resources of a global, comprehensive, research university.  Along with this new project, CASJE’s areas of inquiry include Jewish educational leadership, Jewish early childhood education, Hebrew language education, and Israel education.

CASJE’s Board of Directors includes co-chairs Dr. Michael Feuer and Rabbi Mitchel Malkus, and members Dr. Charles “Chip” Edelsberg, Dr. Rena Dorph (UC Berkeley), Dr. Sharon Feiman-Nemser (Brandeis University), Dr. Ellen Goldring (Vanderbilt University), Dr. Paul Goren (Superintendent of Evanston/Skokie School District 65), Ilana Horwitz (Stanford University), Dr. Benjamin Jacobs (The George Washington University), Dr. Jon Levisohn (Brandeis University), Robert Sherman (The Jewish Education Project), and Dr. Lee Shulman (Stanford University).

Source: Jeducation World

Examining graffiti art. Meeting with Druze and Bedouin families. Visiting an Arab neighborhood in Haifa. Assembling crutches for a nonprofit. Making challah in Tsfat.

Sure, the Israel trips run by 10 Bay Area Jewish day schools and high schools still visit traditional spots such as Masada and the Western Wall in Jerusalem, and there are camel rides and Shabbat dinners.

But evolutions in Israeli society and changes in the interests of the teenagers making those trips has led school administrators to adjust their itineraries as they expose the kids to a diverse, multicultural nation.

“Nothing can replace the Israel trip in terms of fostering the beginnings of a connection, the beginnings of a desire to grapple with the complexity of what Israel is,” said Debby Arzt-Mor, the director of Jewish learning at the Brandeis School of San Francisco. “This is really about sowing the seeds.”

Rabbi Howard Ruben, head of school at Jewish Community High School of the Bay in San Francisco, said the trip leaves students, about half of whom are making their first visit to Israel, “with a deeper appreciation for the complexity and nuance of Israel as a pluralistic and multicultural society and country.

“So what that means is our students encounter Israelis who are artists, who are activists, who are soldiers. They encounter Christians and Muslims and Druzim, and they encounter poor people and entrepreneurs. And they see places in Israel that are homes for people who aren’t always featured on the front page of the newspaper.”

There are eight day schools and two Jewish high schools in the Bay Area that go on Israel trips. The day school students take the journey in eighth grade, while the high schoolers go as juniors. Most of the schools travel right before Passover.

Some have been doing these trips for more than a decade, while Yavneh Day School in Los Gatos ran its first Israel trip earlier this year. Contra Costa Jewish Day School has been traveling to Israel with the Portland Jewish Academy the past seven years.

“We try to provide the students with a basic understanding of the different aspects of life in Israel. Students have met with poets who live in the Gush [West Bank settlement bloc], have met with Israeli students, have met with Ethiopians, have spoken to people who live on the borders of the country, with environmentalists, with peace activists, with Bedouin leaders,” said Bat Sheva Miller, assistant head of school at Oakland Hebrew Day School. “There are places that are a constant part of our itinerary — Jerusalem, Negev, Tel Aviv — and some that change according to the needs of the group, opportunities that arise or events that shape our decisions.”

For some students, the trip is a life-changing experience; they have gone on to make aliyah or take a gap year in Israel before college.

Joy Cheskin of Mountain View went to Israel as an eighth-grader with Gideon Hausner Jewish Day School in Palo Alto, and made a second school trip as a junior with Kehillah Jewish High School, also in Palo Alto. She said the Hausner trip “was the most transformative experience I’ve ever had.”

Now 17 and a high school senior, Cheskin became Israel Club president at Kehillah and plans to take a gap year before college to spend time in Israel. She said she hopes to make aliyah after college. None of those decisions would have been possible without the eighth-grade trip to Israel, she said.

“I fell in love with Israel from the Hausner trip. I truly felt I had gained a second home — I felt I belonged in Israel more than any place in the world. I began to explore my Judaism more deeply, and became traditionally observant in high school,” she told J. “Before going to Israel in eighth grade, I didn’t feel a strong connection to the country. After, I plan to dedicate my life to learning about and advocating for Israel — in Israel.”

Many of the Bay Area schools began their Israel trips as part of an initiative called BASIS, which was implemented by Jewish LearningWorks with grants of nearly $7 million from the Jim Joseph Foundation between 2008 and 2013.

The goal of BASIS, according to its website, was to “integrate Israel education across a school’s curriculum” and to support the building of students’ and educators’ connections to Israel and the Israeli people.

The framework of the school trips has remained the same over the years — giving many kids a first taste of life in Israel, introducing returnees or Israeli natives to previously undiscovered elements of the society, and bringing their classes and Hebrew lessons to life while developing bonds with Israel.

For Jules Willick, the enticement of a trip to Israel led her to transfer to Kehillah halfway through her junior year. She said the journey increased her attachment to Jewish holidays and led her to attend synagogue more often, and now has encouraged her to spend half of a gap year before college in Israel.

Willick, 17, of Palo Alto, will spend the first half of her gap year in Spain before moving to Jerusalem to take intensive Hebrew classes. Willick, who plans to attend Colorado College as a physics major starting in the fall of 2019, said it’s unlikely she’d be spending part of her gap year in Israel if she hadn’t gone on the Kehillah trip.

“I don’t think I really had a good idea of what Israel would be like before I went on the trip,” she told J. “One of the experiences I remember most from the Israel trip was when we went to the Western Wall. A bunch of people started singing and dancing, and a lot of us joined in. It felt really unified. That encouraged me to want to go back there.”

Though school groups hit most of the usual Israeli tourist sites, they also try to focus on building bonds between their students and Israeli kids their age, often by partnering with schools in Israel.

“Our itinerary has grown to focus more on mifgashim (encounters) with different Israeli populations, meetings with near peers, minority groups and homestays,” said Hadas Rave, director of Jewish life at Contra Costa Jewish Day School. “We are working to move away from the ‘on the bus, off the bus’ tourist experience. We want our students to experience Israel as a living, breathing, real place with challenges and issues that they can connect to and hopefully be involved in finding solutions to in the future.”

Such encounters include everything from group discussions to games of Ultimate Frisbee with Palestinian teens. Community service in Israel also has become an emphasis for several Bay Area schools.

Kehillah, Hausner and the Ronald C. Wornick Jewish Day School in Foster City are among those whose students play with kids at Save a Child’s Heart, a nonprofit based in Holon that brings youngsters with heart defects to Israel for treatment from around the world. Students also assemble crutches at Yad Sarah, an Israeli volunteer organization that provides free or low-cost assistance to the sick, disabled and elderly.

“While you’re having this amazing experience, you should be giving back to that community and making the world a better place,” said Lisa Strauss, director of marketing and communications at Kehillah. “For the Israel trip, it’s seamlessly built into the itinerary — instead of a walking tour, we’ll go volunteer.”

At Brandeis Marin in San Rafael, the constant search to keep teenagers engaged has led to a focus on graffiti.

In each of the last four years, students have selected an Israeli graffiti artist and connected with that person before the trip — often by Skype or other social media. When the students see that artist’s work in Israel, they point it out to their peers and discuss the social themes behind the graffiti.

“The graffiti itself touches on issues related to diversity, refugees, Arab-Jewish issues, so the kids are able to grapple in age-appropriate ways with these issues, and that is a really profound experience,” said head of school Peg Sandel. “I’ve been on Israel trips for years and years, and I’ve never seen anything like it before.”

The program has become so popular that Brandeis Marin is developing an art and culture sequence, starting in kindergarten, to engage students in thinking about Israel and the complexity of its society.

“It’s a hip medium the kids are naturally drawn to, and it cultivates attachment to Israel,” Sandel said. “We’ve tried to move away from looking at the history of Israel through its wars.”

To Ora Gittelson-David, the director of Jewish studies at Hausner, the key is to keep the kids entertained while also dealing with the conflicts and changes in contemporary Israeli society — including the development of high-tech innovation that is familiar to kids from the Silicon Valley.

“The trip is about the kids forming a connection where they hug and wrestle with Israel,” she said. “Eighth-graders are on the cusp. They have the ability to really understand nuance more. The trip is a fun thing for them — so you need to find those places they can see some of the more conflictual stuff that doesn’t involve  sitting around and listening to a lecture.”

Source: J- The Jewish News of Northern California 

Ilana Kaufman has been appointed Director of the Jews of Color Field Building Initiative effective August 1, 2018. Ilana previously served as a Program Officer at the San Francisco Federation and Endowment Fund. She was also the principal architect of the Initiative during its pilot phase. Ilana is a nationally recognized leader, author, speaker and trainer working at the intersection of Jewish Community/Racial Justice/Jews of Color/Philanthropy.

The Jews of Color Field Building Initiative (the Initiative) is a new national effort focused on building and advancing the professional, organizational and communal field for Jews of Color. Funded by a growing consortium of funders – the initial stage includes the Walter and Elise Haas Fund, the Jim Joseph Foundation, the Leichtag Foundation and the Charles and Lynn Schusterman Family Foundation. Framed by the concepts of Racial Justice and Equity as well as centering the voices and experiences of Jews of Color, the Initiative is dedicated to grant making, research and field building, and community education. The Initiative hosts the nation’s first ever philanthropic and capacity building fund expressly dedicated to responding to racial injustice through helping further establish, fortify and building-out the field of support for Jews of Color.

“Leading the Jews of Color Field Building Initiative is an unbelievable privilege and a tremendous responsibility. I am among truly gifted colleagues, and we are doing work that will make our community and nation more expansive and loving,” said Kaufman. The moments where I feel challenged by the scale of this undertaking are always tempered by the fact that we are doing work that will literally strengthen our people. In this national climate of racial tension and injustice, it means everything to help make the Jewish community more just, safe, and reflective of who we really are as a people.”

To reach the Jews of Color Field Building Initiative and Ilana, please email: [email protected].

Source: eJewishPhilanthropy

When we at Ayeka began speaking about Soulful Education over a decade ago – and even dared to use the “G-word,” eyes rolled and conversations ended. Today, we see schools competing to bring their educators to our Soulful Education trainings where Ayeka helps teachers to focus on their inner lives, as a vital first step in transmitting Jewish values and teachings.

The outcomes are substantial:

• More attentive listening; less posturing;
• greater honesty and humility (“I’m a work in progress”);
• more compassion and less jealousy (“Everyone else is a work in progress as well”);
• improved teamwork and bonding – community progress can’t be achieved alone;
• and the courage to keep daring and even fail.

Ten years on and there is less judgment, fear and in-fighting and more honesty, harmony and cooperation across a cadre of Ayeka-trained educators spanning the Jewish denominational spectrum. These educators view Jewish education from a more soulful, God-centered perspective in which their personal connection to Judaism matches or surpasses the breadth of their Jewish knowledge.

What if we replicate this result among Jewish leaders who are responsible for steering Jewish communal life? Could we foster greater respect, tolerance and cohesion in the Jewish communities in which we live and work?

We propose building ‘Soulful Communities’ in which Jewish leaders strengthen their efforts to work more closely together, without ego, to advance not only their own organization’s mission, but that of their community as well. Because it is ultimately on the communal level – and in the dynamic between organizations serving the community – that will define whether it is working cohesively, directing its resources to best serve local needs and the Jewish world at large.

Jewish communities face rampant assimilation, growing disinterest by Millenials, and a plethora of organizations pulling in different directions. In this environment, it is vital for organizational leaders to find common purpose and to pull together.

We believe that communities need to discover their souls as much as individuals do. The soul of a community longs for the integration of its constituent parts in the same way an individual’s soul needs the body’s parts to function harmoniously. Soulful communities seek common purpose and unity, even while acknowledging and respecting the differences of its various parts.

How do Jewish leaders create a soulful community?

Through bringing together community stakeholders to focus, individually and collectively, on their own inner lives. In cohorts, seminars and online forums, participants integrate Jewish spiritual principles and practices that facilitate personal growth which translate into improved cross-institutional relationships.

Supported by leading change-agents and funders in the educational arena, including AVI CHAI, Jim Joseph, Kohelet and Mayberg Foundations, Ayeka nurtures soulfulness at leading day schools and high schools across North America. We are also replicating this in the family sphere through our “Soulful Parenting” and “Soulful Individual” tracks.

We are confident that transforming a community into a Soulful Community will foster greater respect, tolerance and cohesion among today’s Jewish leaders.

To learn more, contact: [email protected]

David Kahn is Chairman of the Board of Ayeka.

Source: eJewishPhilanthropy