Joining the Jewish Future!

Participants at this year's Jewish Federations of North America's General Assembly (GA) in New Orleans had a unique opportunity to imagine and shape the future of Jewish education and the Jewish community.

On November 8th, the GA hosted the first-ever Jewish Futures Conference. This extraordinary event brought together visionary thinkers, passionate leaders, and fresh voices to chart a course for the future of Jewish learning and life.  "The goal of the conference," stated Harlene Appelman, Executive Director of the Covenant Foundation, one of the event's co-sponsors, "is to excite and stimulate thinking about the potential of creative and thoughtful Jewish education."  The conference did this, according to David Bryfman of New York's Jewish Education Project, a co-sponsor, "by providing a space to dream, learn, and engage in purposeful conversation.  At a time when the Jewish community is at a crossroads, this is an ideal opportunity to showcase some of the best thinking in the Jewish educational world."

The Jewish Futures Conference was keynoted by several provocative speakers, including Ori Brafman, acclaimed author of The Starfish and the Spider: The Unstoppable Power of Leaderless Organizations, and Laurie Karr, a marketing and branding expert on families and youth, who will explore the social, cultural, and technological trends that are shaping our world. Their talks were followed by a GA first: presentations on the implications of these trends for Jewish learning and life by several speakers being chosen from an open video competition.  "The competition is a way to ensure that emerging voices are given the respect and space they deserve," stated Bryfman.  "In today's world, ideas can come from all angles - established organizations and young people alike."

Participants in the conference also had a chance to add their own ideas to the mix.  There were opportunities to discuss how to bring new ideas to fruition in their own communities during roundtable discussions which will conclude the conference.  As with the mix of presenters, the aim was to attract a diverse group of participants.  "We believe that the conference was valuable for anyone who is involved in trying to enrich the Jewish present and future, and especially worthwhile for those who are themselves involved in transformational learning initiatives or have a major role in allocating resources for Jewish education," said Jonathan Woocher, Director of JESNA's Lippman Kanfer Institute, also a co-sponsor of the conference.

Bringing the Jewish Futures Conference to the General Assembly enhanced and broadened this premier event on the Jewish communal calendar.  "Our goal is to open the GA to new audiences through innovative and forward thinking programming like this conference," stated JFNA's Andrea Fram Plotkin, one of the key organizers of the event.  "We will be successful if participants made connections with stimulating ideas and other people and left inspired to try something new in their organization or community," added Bryfman.

Full coverage of the Jewish Futures Conference is available at www.jewishfutures.net.

The Jewish Futures Conference is sponsored by Jewish Education Project, The Covenant Foundation, JESNA's Lippman Kanfer Institute and The Jewish Federations of North America.

For general information and media relations contact: Rika Levin, Chief Marketing Officer, JESNA at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it or 212-284-6703.

We would like to thank the Lippman Kanfer Family Foundation, the Covenant Foundation, and the Mandell L. and Madeleine H. Berman Foundation for their generous financial contributions to this conference.

This week we celebrate the holiday of Shavuot - a time of revelation, a time of renewal, and a time of recommitment to Jewish covenant and Jewish learning. If I were to pick a holiday, which best exemplifies our mission at JESNA, it would surely be Shavuot. Rabbi Yitz Greenberg, in his book The Jewish Way, talks about the challenge of teaching Judaism, in the context of this holiday:

"As with any transmission of tradition, there is a danger that the freshness and depth of covenantal commitment will be lost .... The work of all previous generations would be forfeit, if one entire generation of relay runners dropped the torch .... The holiday of Shavuot is a response to these concerns. It celebrates and renews the covenant of the Jewish People."

The challenge that we face today in Jewish education is finding those "relay runners"—finding them, engaging them and empowering them to learn. In this week's parsha Beha'alotcha, there is an incident that speaks to this very issue:

In response to Moshe's frustration with Bnei Yisrael's ongoing complaints, Gd instructs him to select 70 elders (the precursors of the Sanhedrin) to help him govern the people. We then learn that two of these chosen elders, Eldad and Medad, are prophesizing in the camp. Joshua advises Moshe to put a stop to this, but Moshe responds differently:

"U'mi yitain kol am Hashem nevi'im." (If only all of Gd's people were prophets.)

Moshe understands that if Bnei Yisrael are to progress in their journey from slavery to freedom, if they are to learn what it means to build a Jewish community, they need to feel empowered and to be fully engaged in the enterprise.

And so it is today, that the new e-words in Jewish education are engagement and empowerment. However, I worry sometimes that too many of our communities are diverting their limited resources for Jewish education to engagement, and may be losing sight of that other e-word which we've been striving towards these past years—excellence.

Don't get me wrong. Engagement and empowerment are critical to moving Jewish education forward to new levels of access and reach. If we can't engage those "relay runners," we won't be able to transmit our tradition, no matter how brightly the torch burns. On the other hand, if the torch is barely burning, what exactly do we expect these "relay runners" to transmit?!

These questions and the metaphor of the torch bring me back to the parsha. Beha'alotcha opens with instructions to Aaron regarding the daily lighting of the Menorah in the Mishkan, the Tabernacle, which was dedicated in the previous parsha Naso. The commentators ask why this passage is inserted right after the list of dedication offerings presented by each of the tribal leaders. Rashi responds that Aaron was upset that the tribe of Levi had no role in the dedication ceremony; so Gd comforted him with the news that he would be responsible for lighting the Menorah every day.

The Or HaChaim takes this one step further and teaches that, in order to clean and prepare the lamps of the Menorah, they had to be removed; so that, in effect, Aaron was rebuilding the Menorah and rededicating the Mishkan on a daily basis. This image of the Menorah being rebuilt and rekindled every day can serve as a model for us, as we struggle with the issues of quantity and quality in Jewish education.

The Menorah is our heritage, our values, our language, our texts. We may take it apart, analyze it, and put it back together again; but it remains the immutable essence of who we are as a Jewish people. Its role, however, is to support and contain the flames which, unlike the Menorah, are in a constant state of change.

The lit Menorah, then, represents the balance between tradition, and its relevance in an ever-changing world; the balance between teaching what is essential to understanding Judaism, and what is meaningful to today's learners in their highly-connected universe; the balance between engaging a multitude of Jewish learners, and ensuring the quality of what they learn.

If JESNA and its partners are to succeed at achieving meaningful change in Jewish education—change that incorporates innovative thinking and practices, and moves Jewish life forward to new levels of access and excellence—then we need to ensure that the initiatives, which we identify, develop and promote, are characterized by the balance of the lit Menorah.

From The Jewish Federation of Greater Hartford:

The Commission on Jewish Education & Leadership recently convened rabbis, educators, and community leaders to learn about WOW!: a collaborative community initiative with Jewish Education Service of North America (JESNA). WOW!'S goal is to engage greater numbers of children and families in satisfying and impactful complementary Jewish educational experiences by enhancing what exists and expanding the range of program options to meet the needs of 21st century Jewish learners. JESNA Vice President, Dr. Leora Isaacs, met with representatives from several synagogues and community institutions to describe the WOW! process which will help the community assess and appreciate what currently exists in the community and where there are growth opportunities (Discovery Phase); envision what might be (Dream Phase); co-construct what should be (Design Phase) and actualize, learn and improve (Destiny Phase).

Read the full post at jewishhartford.org...

From eJewishPhilanthropy:

Fourth-grade students at Temple Israel Center in White Plains, NY recently gathered for one of a series of Havdalah programs, splitting into groups and discussing the blessings and ritual objects and even making some of their own.

Not particularly unusual on its face. But what made it more notable was the fact that it occurred beyond the synagogue walls, in someone's home, and most importantly, that parents participated as well.

Read the full article in eJewishPhilanthropy...

From The Jewish Daily Forward:

Before sending her 6-year-old son, Charlie, off to day school in September, Brenda Hite wondered if she'd made the right decision. Neither Hite nor her husband, Tom, are Jewish, but the public school options in their hometown of Akron, Ohio, didn't enthrall them. So they applied to the local Lippman School, which impressed the Hites with its new global perspective and its energetic and experienced educators.

"Once we learned more about the Jewish culture and religion, and how steeped everything is in Old World values, the Lippman School became very attractive to us," said Hite, who, like her husband, grew up in a Christian household. Also, she said, "It didn't feel like Charlie would get the individualized attention at a public school that he would receive at Lippman."

Read the full article in The Jewish Daily Forward...

From The Western Mass Jewish Ledger:

Each year the Jewish Ledger makes a list of "Movers & Shakers" people in the Jewish community who are making a difference. Here is the Ledger's list of 2011 Movers & Shakers in Western Massachusetts:

Read the full article at The Western Mass Jewish Ledger...

From eJewishPhilanthropy:

by Andrea Rose Cheatham Kasper

In response to last year's Jewish Futures Conference competition on "prosumerism", the idea of Yadaim, the Academy of Applied Academics was born. To be clear it was an idea that was in the making for well over a year which crystallized in a competitive context. The competition asked the public to critically think about how co-creation of Judaism and Jewish education can manifest itself in innovative and dynamic ways which will capture the imagination of the public.

The trend of prosumerism is only one major trend we face today, another is a trend grounded in resourcefulness and utility, the ability to do things on our own. Prosumerism is the idea that people have evolved from simply being consumers to actively creating the world and experiences they seek. In the Jewish context, this means that Jews no longer look to an authority to tell them how to be Jewish nor through what traditions or practices, instead they are looking to collaborate and co-create a Judaism that is meaningful to them. By embracing this trend we evolve from being only intellectual creators of our world to actual creators of our world and experiences. By embracing this trend we move from a one dimensional focus on intellect to a fuller educational and Jewish conception of being God's partners in the physical, material/economic, spiritual and intellectual work of the world.

Read the full article in eJewishPhilanthropy...