Later this month, The Cohen Center for Modern Jewish Studies at Brandeis University will host Learning from Taglit-Birthright Israel, the first academic conference to examine what scholars, practitioners, and policy makers can learn from Taglit-Birthright Israel, the largest single educational program in the Jewish world today. Since it was launched in 1999, Taglit has brought nearly 300,000 Diaspora young adults to Israel and involved another 60,000 Israeli peers. By expanding the number and variety of scholars and public policy intellectuals engaged in the examination of Taglit, the conference will further develop the study of Taglit as a social experiment in educational innovation and elaborate on a wide variety of substantive issues including the following: The impact of Taglit on American … Continue Reading
Study Released: American Jewish Giving to Israeli Organizations
The Cohen Center for Modern Jewish Studies (Brandeis University) has released a new report examining an important facet of the American Jewish community's relationship to Israel, philanthropy. The New Philanthropy: American Jewish Giving to Israeli Organizations was developed by Eric Fleisch and Ted Sasson and analyzes the growth in philanthropic support for Israeli non-profits over the past decade and a half. This is the first research of its kind to provide a comprehensive account (within the limits of the available data) of American Jewish giving in Israel. from the introduction: In recent years, scholars of the American Jewish community have noted declining contributions to the federations and declining transfers by federations to overseas causes including Israel. Some observers have … Continue Reading
Jewish Federations – Jewish Peoplehood in Action
This essay is from The Peoplehood Papers, volume 7 – Reinvigorating Jewish Peoplehood: The Philanthropic Perspective; published by the Center for Jewish Peoplehood Education. by Rebecca Caspi and Lisa Friedman Throughout the generations, the great strength of the Jewish community has been its distinct ability to organize itself. In North America this found expression through securing the rights of minorities; gaining a significant political foothold; setting up a comprehensive system of Jewish charitable, defense and educational institutions; and, providing substantial support to the State of Israel and to Jews around the world. As we witness the current shifting social, demographic and economic trends that impact our long standing communal efforts, we note that the fundamentals of … Continue Reading
Volunteering and Young Jewish Adults
by Jessica Baverman There have been constant messages in the media saying that the millennial generation (those of us born between 1980 and the early to late 1990s) care little about our community and are more likely to spend time in front of a computer than interacting with our peers. In fact, these are both wrong statements. Among Jewish young adults, volunteerism and social interactions are strongly linked. In St. Louis, Jewish Federation has created a collaborative volunteer project designed specifically for young adults. The ‘Karen Solomon Young Adult Service Initiative’ is a collaboration of three Jewish organizations: Next Dor STL, the Jewish young adult community center; the Jewish Community Relations Council (JCRC) and Jewish Community Center (JCC). The project will offer an … Continue Reading
How to Fix Our Approach to Evaluation Research in Jewish Education – and Why We Need To
by Eran Tamir The Jewish community is blessed with lay leaders, philanthropists and professionals committed to creating vibrant and innovative Jewish learning opportunities across the lifespan. Their relentless efforts have resulted in many exciting new educational initiatives. Still, it is no secret that while we all have great hopes that each one of these initiatives will become a great success and have lasting impact on the field, not all do. Identifying the most effective initiatives is a daunting task, one for which solid evaluation research becomes a must for policymakers and funders. In 2007 I established the DeLeT Longitudinal Survey at the Mandel Center for Studies in Jewish Education at Brandeis University. The project studies and tracks the careers of alumni of DeLeT, a professional … Continue Reading
Engaging Jewish Teens
by Leonard Saxe Over the last two decades a host of commissions and task forces have assessed how the Jewish community can reach out to post-bnai mitzvah teens. The Reform movement, in their just concluded Biennial meeting, declared “Youth Engagement” as their number one priority. They, along with other non-Orthodox movements, recognize that the bar and bat mitzvah ceremony is an inflection point in the lives of American Jews. The question that has bedeviled adults has been how to engage teens once they step off the bimah at age 12 or 13. In a new report, commissioned by UJA-Federation of New York and The Jewish Education Project, Amy Sales and colleagues at Brandeis University’s Cohen Center for Modern Jewish Studies studied New York-area parents, teenagers, and youth workers. They … Continue Reading
Socio-Demography Conference Opens Today
Leading researchers and policymakers gather today to discuss the current state of knowledge about the U.S. Jewish community and consider how the findings of socio-demographic research can be used. Bringing together leading scholars and policy makers for two days of intensive discussion of the state of the Jewish community, the Socio-Demography of American Jewry conference opens today at Brandeis University. The Conference, hosted by the Steinhardt Social Research Institute and the Cohen Center for Modern Jewish Studies at Brandeis, is co-sponsored by academic research centers in Israel and the United States, the Association for the Scientific Study of Jewry and the Pew Forum on Religion and Policy. Previously, the Jewish community sponsored a decennial survey of American Jewry, both to assess … Continue Reading
The Health of Jewish Summer Camp Revealed
JData has launched JData Revealed, a monthly newsletter with information and ideas from JData.com. Developed at Brandeis University with the support of the Jim Joseph Foundation, JData is a public repository of information about the organizations that comprise the Jewish education system in North America. With the 2011 summer camp season winding up, it is appropriate the inaugural issue focuses on the world of nonprofit Jewish summer camps - enrollments, budgets, staffing and other data that define the size, shape and health of the field. These camps, key institutions in the Jewish educational system in North America, are known for fun, friendships and creativity. Yet they are also settings in which children, teens and young adults are immersed in Jewish life and community and where Jewish … Continue Reading
The Jews We Leave Behind
The Jews we leave behind We need to revamp education to reach all our children by Leonard Saxe In psychotherapy, the YAVIS client is “Young, Attractive, Verbal, Intelligent and Successful.” YAVIS clients have the best prognosis, yet remain the longest in treatment. Therapists like such highly motivated clients and eschew those who are less engaging. Likewise, in Jewish education, we focus our attention on those who are most highly motivated. Both resources and opportunities are directed to the children of the most highly engaged families, and we provide relatively few resources to those who need Jewish education the most. In North America, our flagship Jewish educational institutions are full-time day schools, and they garner the bulk of resources devoted to Jewish education. Nearly … Continue Reading
The Kids are All Right
by Yehuda Kurtzer, PhD In his recent article on eJp, Scott Brown laments the absence of great talent and a steady supply of young professionals into Jewish life, and blames the organizations and institutions for failing to create the systems to invite in, grow and ultimately keep this talent. While I admire the self-reflective tone of Brown’s piece, most of the prescriptions that Brown offers (tools for retention and growth, e.g.) together with the correctives that commentators have added (better salaries!) - while valuable and needed - seem to be less specific to the Jewish professional sector, and merely good practices across the board for healthy professional environments. What’s more, having spent two years recently on the faculty of the Hornstein program and meeting three classes of eager … Continue Reading
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