By Toby Tabachnick
The research and statistics are in, and the message to Jewish legacy organizations – those longstanding community institutions that historically have held fast to the status quo – is loud and clear: To be viable into the 21st century, the template must change.
Synagogues, Jewish federations and other organizations are already facing a perfect storm of societal shifts as the sheer number of non-Orthodox Jews continues to plummet and millennials trend toward a new paradigm of customization and personalization.
A new report by the Jewish People Policy Institute has shown that marriage trends in the non-Orthodox Jewish community reflect those of the general population, and are poised to have devastating effects on membership in traditional Jewish organizations. Non-Orthodox Jews are marrying later and are having fewer children. Moreover, intermarriage rates are soaring, exceeding 70 percent in the non-Orthodox community.
Because marital status and parenting “is closely tied to levels of Jewish engagement,” and because the intermarried statistically are far less likely to raise their children as Jewish than the in-married, legacy institutions necessarily will be looking at a dwindling pool of potential members and donors.
“Like global warming, the recession in most forms of American Jewish organized life outside of Orthodoxy is already underway,” wrote Steven M. Cohen, research professor of Jewish social policy at Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion, in an upcoming paper, The Shrinking Jewish Middle – and What to Do About It.
“Low Jewish birthrates combined with high rates of intermarriage are producing fewer non-Orthodox Jews with moderate-to-advanced education and cultural skills to allow for knowledgeable participation and leadership in Jewish life,” Cohen explains. Even if the future size of the non-Orthodox population remains stable, those non-Orthodox Jews who engage in Jewish life will decline, “with direct adverse consequences for the entire organized Jewish communal infrastructure outside of Orthodoxy.”
But low numbers is just one problem facing Jewish legacy institutions. The other is a rising demographic that finds little or no relevance in many of the services and programs provided by these organizations.
Needed in its time and place
The legacy institutions of the 20th century served worthy and definite purposes, helping Jews transition into life in America, developing the Jewish body politic, establishing the State of Israel and advancing the concept of Jewish peoplehood, explained Rabbi Irwin Kula, president of CLAL, the National Jewish Center for Learning and Leadership.
“The role religion played was to help us assimilate in America,” Kula said. “That’s why synagogues look like churches. They were designed by the same architects. The building of the synagogues had nothing to do with religion; they were about integrating into America.”
But now that Jews have successfully assimilated, legacy institutions need to reevaluate their missions, Kula stressed.
“We know from the data – the [2013] Pew study – that 93 percent of Jews are proud of being Jewish,” Kula said. “But the legacy institutions say that’s not real pride because they are not participating the way we want them to. And 84 percent of Jews say that Judaism is important in their lives. So, Jews don’t need legacy institutions to feel that Judaism is important.”
Legacy institutions must begin to “reimagine” themselves, Kula said. “And it’s hard for them to do.”
Many legacy institutions “almost certainly won’t and should not be” part of the Jewish landscape in the next 30 to 40 years, predicted Rabbi Danny Schiff, the Jewish Federation of Greater Pittsburgh’s Foundation scholar.
“It seems to me we are at an inflection point in Jewish life and that much of what was relevant in the 20th century won’t be relevant in the 21st century,” Schiff said. “Many of the organizations that we have around about us right now are holdovers from 20th-century Judaism that will not be relevant and can’t be repurposed to the 21st century.”
The challenge to old-school organizations to maintain relevance is not unique to Jewish institutions but extends to American society more generally, said Jonathan Sarna, a professor of American Jewish history at Brandeis University.
“People are much less interested than they once were in broad, multi-purpose institutions like federations and so on, and much more interested in narrowly-based institutions whose purposes and success they can discern and measure,” Sarna said.
Specificity of purpose speaks to the millennial generation, agreed Rabbi Mike Uram, executive director of Hillel at the University of Pennsylvania and author of Next Generation Judaism: How College Students and Hillel Can Help Reinvent Jewish Organizations.
Uram has spent countless hours talking one-on-one with hundreds of college students about their Judaism and the types of Jewish programming that interests them. Millennial Jews, by and large, want the same type of specification and customization in their Jewish experiences that they want in other aspects of their lives, he found.
“Someone described millennials as the ‘my way, right away, why pay?’ generation,” Uram said. “I’m 41 years old. When I was in college, we all got together in the dorm lounge and watched Friends and Seinfeld before we went out to parties on Thursday nights. No one in college is getting together to watch TV now, other than sports. They are all watching the same shows, but not in the same room. They are streaming them on their phones or on their laptops; they are binge watching, so they are out of sync with each other.”
In addition to a customization mentality, Uram said, research has shown that “millennials are the least trustful generation of any generation since Pew has been doing research.”
The upshot, Uram said, is that “millennials don’t trust group think, they don’t want large, umbrella generic things. They want to be co-creators in their experiences and in what they consume, and they want to feel like it’s just for them.”
Seeking solutions
To preserve Jewish institutional involvement going forward into the next century, the community must first confront the challenges posed by high rates of intermarriage, according to Cohen. Community resources, he said, must be spent on increasing the opportunities for Jews to connect with other Jews, thereby increasing the likelihood that they will marry each other, have Jewish children and engage in organized Jewish life.
“While the organized Jewish community has (properly) responded to rising intermarriage by investing in Jewish education (day schools, camps, Israel travel, campus activities, and more – all of which are linked with higher rates of in-marriage), it has never explicitly adopted a policy of strengthening Jewish social networks among adolescents and Jewish young adults,” Cohen wrote.
Accordingly, Cohen urges the community to provide low-cost opportunities for Jewish summer camp; broaden participation in high school trips to Israel; field conversion-dedicated rabbis “to address the untapped market in conversion”; subsidize Jewish pre-schools and day care centers; and lobby for pro-parent public policy with the goal of boosting the birthrates of middle class American Jews.
Perhaps just as important as focusing on the number of Jews, though, is figuring out how best to serve them in a rapidly changing world.
“The first challenge is for the people in charge of legacy institutions to be painfully honest about the services that are working for them,” Kula said.
The large, umbrella “macro communities” constructed by legacy institutions are antithetical to the types of programs and services that resonate with many millennials, Uram said.
“Legacy organizations tend to favor macro communities – how many people can we get to join, or show up or become members or to donate? – when what millennials want is highly customized, small, intimate gatherings, that tend to have much more rigorous Jewish content,” Uram said. “One of the ways legacy organizations can re-invent themselves is not by making a binary choice between the macro model and the more micro customized model, but to find a way to do both at the same time.”
It would be a mistake, however, for legacy institutions to “pretend that what works for just 20 percent of Jews,” works for everyone else, he said.
Uram suggested that legacy organizations “begin to experiment with models that function in the micro community way, with customized, intimate, smaller Jewish experiences where the organization brings those experiences to people where they live, work and play,” while at the same time, maintaining longstanding services to those for whom they still resonate.
Following the “disruptive innovation” model developed at Harvard Business School, Uram invigorated Jewish life at Penn by maintaining Hillel’s legacy programming, while creating a second, separate organization designed to engage students who wanted a different sort of Jewish experience.
“We launched a second Jewish organization called the Jewish Renaissance Project (JRP) that operates as a shadow brand [to Hillel],” Uram said. “Just like you have GAP, and Banana Republic and Old Navy, we thought, ‘Why should there just be one brand of Hillel?’”
The JRP has “created these little pockets of 15 to 20 people with similar interests,” he said. “They meet weekly and do Jewish study and Jewish leadership development. We pay them, and they create Jewish life for their friends.”
The bigger picture
For Schiff, the particular models of institutional programming will be secondary to the larger issue of discerning what Judaism has to offer in terms of contending with a rapidly changing world.
“It strikes me that what Jewish organizations that are going to be useful in the 21st century need to focus on are what are the great ideas, what are the great thought challenges that Judaism and Jews need to contend with in the 21st century, and focus on responding to those issues,” Schiff said.
It’s having “relevant, important significant things to say about those challenges that will make organizations relevant. The really big challenge is: Where is the core focus of human life in this age headed, and therefore, what are the things Judaism needs to say that will be important enough to galvanize people of whatever age to be involved in Jewish life?”
Schiff is working on a book on the direction of 21st century Judaism examining contemporary questions Judaism must address to remain relevant going forward.
“Just one question that we need to start grappling with is, how do we, as human beings obviously coming from a Jewish perspective, incorporate that in a responsible way into our lives that still maintains our humanity?” Schiff said. “If we don’t have any answer to that question, how relevant are we?”
This article originally appeared in The Jewish Chronicle; reprinted with permission.
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This well-writted article (thank you Toby Tabachnick!) lays out two theories of why younger Jewish adults are relatively uninvolved in conventional Jewish life. One, to which I personally subscribe as does Prof. Sylvia Fishman and others, places the “blame” on changing demographics: Lower rates of marriage, inmarriage, fertility and effective Jewish fertility. In fact, non-Orthodox Jews with Jewish children are probably MORE involved in Jewish life than their predecessors 30 or 40 years ago. The other theory (which Rabbi Irwin Kula advances) lays the “blame” at the feet of unreconstructed legacy institutions. In essence, he’s saying, if only we can make a more appealing Jewish community we’ll appeal to more Jews.
If only it were so easy. Or even doable. (Note that Irwin doesn’t tell us how to invent new institutions.)
Of course we should work on improving Jewish life. But, Sylvia and I are saying, don’t give up on improving Jewish family choices. Most young adult Jews want to marry, to marry Jews, to have children, and to have Jewish children. Let’s help them make all that possible.
Jewish Without Walls (JWOW), a 6-year old start-up, uses a community organizing model to bring families together in micro-communities to celebrate holidays and learn about Jewish Wisdom and traditions to bring them into their homes. All of our experiences are co-created with local moms and dads so they are hyper relevant to the needs and interests of today’s busy families. JWOW’s impact on kids, parents and the community has been tremendous. Yet, we struggle for funding and we are still not financially sustainable — even though our budget requirements are tiny compared to legacy organizations. How can Federations and family foundations better support new initiatives that are filling the needs of today’s families?
Beth, I would suggest not waiting for Federations and Foundations to catch on and support you, and instead learn to fundraise and engage leadership from the community like the legacy institutions have honed over the last 100 years. It’s not easy (because nothing new is easy) but it’ll help you become self-reliant and sustainable.
The concept of crafting “micrommunuties” within the “legacy organizations” is on the mark– and in fact is well underway for many federations. Further– we do this work — not in a vacuum, but, in many instances,aligned with our agency and synagogue partners. Our J-Pride (with our JCC), our Jewish-Latino Teen Coalition, our Women’s Philanthropy efforts to rally the Jewish community around a local women’s homeless shelter– these are a handful of examples of our many customized projects. All of this is wrapped around our Jewish Community Concierge to help folks find their place. The premise that legacy organizations can’t be innovative should be viewed as myth– I agree they they must not only be innovative but do so in collaboration with community partners.
A two step reformation is required to start. Hands on, Jewish values driven activities that have social and spiritual impact, and which meet both the individual’s Jewish and general needs should be the foundation of future Jewish community building. Disaster response, cemetery cleaning, visiting the sick or home bound seniors, home repairs, Big Brother/ Sister types programs and the like should be considered and implemented. They are personal and meaningful. The parallel institutional step is to reframe the role of professionals in Jewish institutional life — especially in membership and social institutions — to be more volunteer coordinators than direct service providers. These steps will attract affiliation as they give meaning and respect in a Jewish context to the “Jews out there.”
Let me begin by saying, I wouldn’t read these articles if I didn’t think statistics help us with understanding where we are and where we MAY be headed. Please don’t read this as saying, we should just keep plugging away the same failing way we have been for decades and pray for a change.
That said, the Titanic was unsinkable, automobiles were widely called a fad, and the Beatles were told four piece boy bands are out. More recently, movie theater attendance was supposed to fall due to a plethora of cheap big screens, newer release rentals, streaming and binge watching, Online shopping and websites were supposed to flop, and oh, by the way, Hilary Clinton was going to win by a landslide.
Examining, adapting, renovating (possibly down-sizing or sharing space) and re-imagining are excellent suggestions for leaders in the Jewish professional world. Allowing statistics and professional predictions to mean too much has proven over history to be foolhardy.
Completely abandoning the people still coming to worship, abruptly and wholly ridding our institutions of their traditions and styles, and assuming that a swing back will never happen is a terrific recipe for nibbling shoes.
It was heartening to read how Penn Hillel students are looking seriously at the collapse of Jewish legacy organizations and seeking new models of engagement. We’re engaged in a similar process over the next six months here in Atlanta as our Jewish Federation of Greater Atlanta dives into a big, bold community-wide process we’re calling The Front Porch: Unlocking the (Incredible) Potential of Jewish Atlanta. The name is deliberately playful and meant to convey the Southern spirit of “welcome.” As conveners of this work, Federation has assembled diverse teams from across the community to look critically at our Jewish ecosystem. Like the Penn students, we know that in order to thrive for the next 100+ years we cannot march in place. Federation’s value must become clearer, more compelling, and relevant to a new generation. We intend to connect with —and tap into— the significant population of metro Atlanta Jews who remain unconnected to our mission and are unfamiliar with our programs and services. And we know that we must embrace change and innovation, even when it feels uncomfortable. I’ll keep eJP readers posted on Atlanta’s progress and share our insights with you as The Front Porch work unfolds.
–Eric M. Robbins, President & CEO
Jewish Federation of Greater Atlanta
I agree with the article, as a former Hillel professional for over a decade and now as a CEO of a Jewish Federation for over four years the changing shift in messages to the different populations that we serve are significant.
When talking to older members in our community asking for their support, they participate because either their parents gave or they believe in the funding of the institution to take care of the needs of the community. With younger members that message of institutional based giving and involvement is not powerful at all.
In order to figure out the way to get younger community members involved we dramatically changed the way we operated. We eliminated programs and positions that were no longer relevant to our core mission. We stopped using the same language to different generations in our case for their participation and support and we started to use the information in the Pew report as a basis on how to engage the next generation of Jewish Leaders.
We no longer raise funds for the institution with our younger members, we raise money for a specific cause chosen by those member in a peer effort to fund a cause that they feel passionately about. This past year we raised more funds from this demographic by highlighting our Ahava program where we give $1500 to every family in our community who is raising a child with special needs. Its not a need based program and the application process is one page. We developed the program based on conversation with parents on what their real needs are and with national disability advocate organizations. Families have bought ipads with expensive apps to help their children with autism, they have funded extra occupational therapy session, gone to specialized camps. Its having an enormous impact in the lives of these families and its all powered by our younger Jewish community. We have been successful in not only connecting them to this cause but also opening up the doors to see the other things our Federation funds. It’s fascinating to hear their surprise about what we do and how proud they are of our Federation. Without the cause based approach that opens the door to the wider world of what we do, would be dismissed a serious player in their world of their philanthropy.
Another program we started this year due to the Pew report was the EMOJI program (Experience a Memorable, Overnight Jewish Initiative) Essentially we sent any child between 7 – 16 who identified as Jewish in our community to a Jewish overnight Jewish Summer Camp. They had to attend the camp for at least three weeks. (7-10 year olds, at least two weeks) If this was their first time at camp, you got to go for free. If it was your second or third time or more you got to go with 75% off the total cost of camp. This was not a needs based program. It took us two years of planning and cutting back in other areas as well as partnering with our local congregations who gave $500 towards each child going to camp who was a member of their congregation. This summer we sent 33 kids to camp. 17 had never been to camp before and by their parents own admission said they would never have sent their kids to camp. 11 this was their second time and the other were third timers or more. The data is still coming in but we believe that over 90% are sending their kids next year regardless if the Federation has funding for them. They are making camp a priority because we made it ours. We know that no other Federation has a program that pays for 100% of camp that’s not a needs based program with its only motivation is to send kids to camp. We have already been told by parents that they plan on donating to the Federation as well as looking for ways to get involved with us. Our congregations are planning camp reunion Shabbats and to continue the connection to what they can do in our community in between their summers.
I would argue that institutions like ours can play a tremendous role in engaging the next generation of Jewish leaders, however it is going to take an attitude of daring ourselves to be remarkable and to move from an institutional based thinking to a caused based one.
Joel Marcovitch
CEO Jewish Federation of Greater Toledo