In an article picked up from The Jewish Week, today’s ePhilanthropy offers Mark Charendoff's, president of the Jewish Funders Network, suggestion that term limits be imposed on Jewish communal CEOs.
He offers the following benefits. Term limits would:
1. Create a discomfort that generates vibrancy and creativity.
2. New heads of agencies would bring in new people to the board.
3. Middle management professionals would have a chance to move up.
4. Money would be saved as the rising salary of the CEO will be readjusted with the newer, younger hire.
5. Too many agencies are extensions of their CEO, change would break that up.
Generally I agree with him. Agencies do often become the CEO’s private club. Salaries seem to escalate due to years in the job rather than productivity. Middle managers abandon Jewish communal work out of frustration and lack of a living wage, to say nothing of young starry eyed entry level staff who wake up one day and decide to move into the for-profit sector where their talents will be rewarded.
But I also hear a male voice in this message; let me share a perspective that may sound feminine – a quality that Mr. Charendoff is suggesting should be added in the new leadership. Mr. Charendoff’s first suggestion is discomfort brings creativity; we need more discomfort. Has this man been around Jews?! I would say that discomfort and a lack of ease define Jews. And that discomfort has often caused people to cling to old ways. I’ve seen best work done by those who believe they have room to maneuver and know they have the support of their peers. Take a look at non-Jewish Pixar, a place where creativity flows in abundance. The “secret” is not a sense of uncertainly but rather an atmosphere of independence. The employees are permitted time to work on their own concepts. How about we get Jewish CEOs who invite their staffs to take a little chunk of time to dream their best dreams? Then put some of those dreams into action.
Will a new CEOs bring new people to the table? Some will; some won’t. I’m not sure I want the people they would bring; it could be a new set of cronies. I believe the goal is new faces, new demographics: young Jews, Jews of color, single Jews, Jews in interfaith marriages; in other words, the ever evolving face of the Jewish community. A good CEO can do this, period. However, I concede there is an expectation that with a new leader come changes. So the term limit has potential in that it creates a willingness, or at least anticipation, among staff and lay leaders that there will be changes.
Another feminine perspective, I don’t believe in “loyalty opposition;” I believe in trust that creates an openness to hearing a differing opinion. There is plenty of in-fighting already. What would cooperation look like?
Finally, I got a chuckle out of Mr. Charendoff’s making an exception for heads of family foundations. I like his honesty in pointing out that it appears self serving. This may be a case of, living in that family foundation forest it’s hard for him to see the trees. Let me suggest that he is wrong. Who needs shaking up more than a wealthy family that has come to believe their will is God? Perhaps a new CEO, one who questions their views and offers a new perspective, would be a way to get their juices flowing. Perhaps even excite and entice them to dare to try new things and to explore support beyond the dreary and deadly three year grant (one year in the current economy) into a new world in which they create a legacy by supporting some of the Jewish organizations that reach out to the fastest growing, most discomforting portion of our community, interfaith families.
Showing posts with label Policy. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Policy. Show all posts
Wednesday, September 8, 2010
Friday, August 14, 2009
Comments on the Bronfman Book
Several questions/comments were sent to me about the last post.
1. How did you (Dawn) get the book?
Rosanne Levitt, in a visit to the east coast, spoke with an employee of the Bronfman Foundation. She told the woman about the Alliance’s efforts to support advanced education among Interfaith Outreach workers and was offered several copies of the book.
2. Given that Bronfman didn’t connect with the professionals will you (Dawn) be sharing your thoughts with Bronfman and copying key individuals?
I spoke with the same young man who interviewed a number of us for the Foundation about a year ago, Ben Greene. Other key individuals in the work would be YOU ALL!
3. I have begun reading the book but have not found it compelling.
As a professional in this field you will find that the material in the book is already well known to you. In fact we discussed some of this in our Think Tank last September 2008. The book is basically a layperson’s survey of current data. The good news is that we can hope that more people will read and learn some of this basic information. The bad news is that, as a novice, his deductions are not always on target.
Two more thoughts
Perceptions of interfaith couples/families
One problem is that Bronfman uses his intermarried son to gain insight. This is a very common error: The survey of one. You now have a single individual’s experience representing a huge population. This is frequent in our line of work. A parent sees their child intermarry and it impacts them. They come to us with an adamant view informed solely by their child. Or an intermarried Jew comes and believes that all interfaith couples’ marriages are just like theirs. It would have been useful had Bronfman then been aware of this and ackn
Level of sophistication
Second, the challenge to those of us who are long time practitioners in this field is that we may feel discouraged by the lack of experience around us. All the more reason that we need to work on developing a more sophisticated and informed professional group.
1. How did you (Dawn) get the book?
Rosanne Levitt, in a visit to the east coast, spoke with an employee of the Bronfman Foundation. She told the woman about the Alliance’s efforts to support advanced education among Interfaith Outreach workers and was offered several copies of the book.
2. Given that Bronfman didn’t connect with the professionals will you (Dawn) be sharing your thoughts with Bronfman and copying key individuals?
I spoke with the same young man who interviewed a number of us for the Foundation about a year ago, Ben Greene. Other key individuals in the work would be YOU ALL!
3. I have begun reading the book but have not found it compelling.
As a professional in this field you will find that the material in the book is already well known to you. In fact we discussed some of this in our Think Tank last September 2008. The book is basically a layperson’s survey of current data. The good news is that we can hope that more people will read and learn some of this basic information. The bad news is that, as a novice, his deductions are not always on target.
Two more thoughts
Perceptions of interfaith couples/families
One problem is that Bronfman uses his intermarried son to gain insight. This is a very common error: The survey of one. You now have a single individual’s experience representing a huge population. This is frequent in our line of work. A parent sees their child intermarry and it impacts them. They come to us with an adamant view informed solely by their child. Or an intermarried Jew comes and believes that all interfaith couples’ marriages are just like theirs. It would have been useful had Bronfman then been aware of this and ackn
Level of sophistication
Second, the challenge to those of us who are long time practitioners in this field is that we may feel discouraged by the lack of experience around us. All the more reason that we need to work on developing a more sophisticated and informed professional group.
Sunday, September 7, 2008
September Think Tank
In just a few days a group of the long-time professionals in Interfaith Outreach will gather. Our purpose is to develop a foundational understanding of interfaith marriage by looking at all the research to date. We will compare it to our own on-the-ground experience. By combining a study component with Dr. Bruce Phillips and our own first hand knowledge, we plan to work together to draw up a proposal for communities to use as they create outreach programming in their own towns, shuls, JCCs, and agencies.
We are so looking forward to this invigorating experience! So rarely do we have the opportunity to be together and share at this level.
We have been blessed to be supported financially by the Charles and Lynn Schusterman Fund and the Walter and Elise Haas Fund.
Stay tuned as we move forward.
We are so looking forward to this invigorating experience! So rarely do we have the opportunity to be together and share at this level.
We have been blessed to be supported financially by the Charles and Lynn Schusterman Fund and the Walter and Elise Haas Fund.
Stay tuned as we move forward.
Tuesday, July 22, 2008
Jewish Networking
There is a terrific book, Jewish Networking, by Hayim Herring and Barry Shrage published in 2001. In it the authors envision a Jewish community in which a newcomer, or anyone deciding to look for Jewish engagement for the first time, can find their way. The idea is that all the Jewish pieces of the community - JCCs, synagogues, Hebrew schools, day schools, etc. would be interconnected, would be aware of each others programs and services. Thus, no matter who the newcomer first called it didn't matter; they would be gently interviewed and integrated into the appropriate Jewish "home."
We should all be working towards this ideal. Go read this book!
We here in the San Francisco bay area are in the process of formalizing our outreach to interfaith network. For years now the tiny group of professionals have been meeting informally. We have made it a point to know what each other are doing, to collaborate and share. Rosanne Levitt and I began this ten years ago and we were fortunate that our meetings gradually grew to five core members. We include anyone doing outreach in their organization.
Find yourself companions in this work.
We should all be working towards this ideal. Go read this book!
We here in the San Francisco bay area are in the process of formalizing our outreach to interfaith network. For years now the tiny group of professionals have been meeting informally. We have made it a point to know what each other are doing, to collaborate and share. Rosanne Levitt and I began this ten years ago and we were fortunate that our meetings gradually grew to five core members. We include anyone doing outreach in their organization.
Find yourself companions in this work.
Monday, April 7, 2008
The Golden Nugget
I want to invite you to go back over the Saxe/Chertok study, It’s Not Who Stands Under the Chuppah. Look at the numbers. The researchers divided the families into three categories: Jewish-Jewish Families, Interfaith Families, and Conversionary Families.
In all the categories the highest engagement was in the conversionary families. Leading me back to the statement: Conversion is good for the Jews. When an adult goes through the process of examining their identity, their practices, the values and behaviors that will define their lives and then decide that the best way to express the essence of their identity and values is to become a Jew it is not surprising that they then throw themselves into learning and practice.
Just a few months ago I was leading a workshop on Outreach to a group of about 30 professionals who run teen programs. We talked about the segments of our community from which our teens come - LGBT, multiracial Jews, interfaith families. I told them there is one group we haven’t spoken about. Of this group it is still acceptable to say:
they aren’t really Jewish
You can always tell one of them from us.
You know his/her father/mother is one of them.
They are way too into being Jewish.
You can’t really call them Jewish.
Who is this group? I asked the group.
Converts, they responded.
Conversionary families scored higher by all measures than Jewish-Jewish families. They are doing all the things we want parents to do to raise their children as Jews: giving them a Jewish education, practicing Judaism at home, and surrounding themselves and their kids with a Jewish social network. But they remain “other” in many Jewish environments. As recently as two weeks ago I asked a group of Jews by choice if we could take a picture of the group and put it on the website of their synagogue to let browsers know about the program. No, they told me, we won’t deny we are converts, but we don’t want to invite the second class citizenship.
Until we as a community does a better job with conversion and our golden nuggets - the converts - we will sap our own strength.
Much more open and enthusiastic support of these Jews is essential.
In all the categories the highest engagement was in the conversionary families. Leading me back to the statement: Conversion is good for the Jews. When an adult goes through the process of examining their identity, their practices, the values and behaviors that will define their lives and then decide that the best way to express the essence of their identity and values is to become a Jew it is not surprising that they then throw themselves into learning and practice.
Just a few months ago I was leading a workshop on Outreach to a group of about 30 professionals who run teen programs. We talked about the segments of our community from which our teens come - LGBT, multiracial Jews, interfaith families. I told them there is one group we haven’t spoken about. Of this group it is still acceptable to say:
they aren’t really Jewish
You can always tell one of them from us.
You know his/her father/mother is one of them.
They are way too into being Jewish.
You can’t really call them Jewish.
Who is this group? I asked the group.
Converts, they responded.
Conversionary families scored higher by all measures than Jewish-Jewish families. They are doing all the things we want parents to do to raise their children as Jews: giving them a Jewish education, practicing Judaism at home, and surrounding themselves and their kids with a Jewish social network. But they remain “other” in many Jewish environments. As recently as two weeks ago I asked a group of Jews by choice if we could take a picture of the group and put it on the website of their synagogue to let browsers know about the program. No, they told me, we won’t deny we are converts, but we don’t want to invite the second class citizenship.
Until we as a community does a better job with conversion and our golden nuggets - the converts - we will sap our own strength.
Much more open and enthusiastic support of these Jews is essential.
Tuesday, April 1, 2008
It's Not Just Who Stands Under the Chuppah
The Fern Chertok and Leonard Saxe study is out and it is a superb result - informative and useful.
I want to look beyond the headlines. This is not a rosy affirmation that interfaith couples turn out to be just like Jewish - Jewish couples.
What is the study saying?
Yes, interfaith couples, when you control for Jewish education level, look very much like JJ couples in the Reform movement.
But look closely, the JJ couples don’t look so good. This is a bit like saying people with pneumonia don’t look any worse than people with the plague.
Looking at the levels of observance and practice studied we see low numbers for both groups.
Very emotionally attached to Israel
JJ couples 17% IF couples 16%
Any Jewish organizational ties
JJ couples 54% IF couples 57%
Usually light Shabbat candles
JJ couples 13% IF couples 12%
Very important to be Jewish
JJ couples 37% IF couples 29%
In essence, this is a startling revelation of the low level of the Reform Jews’ engagement with Jewish life.
But don’t throw in the towel, there is also good news.
Chertok/Saxe identify three critical elements to Jewish engagement.
1) Jewish Education
Remember that all of the above statistics are based on “controlling for education.” That is, a poorly educated Jew, no matter who they marry, doesn’t do much Jewishly. A well educated Jew, no matter who they marry, does – or is significantly more likely to.
As one highly educated Jew in my community put it, “I painted a very orthodox picture of life with me to my (now) husband when we were talking about marriage.” Indeed, she and her husband and children are synagogue affiliated, active in Federation, and the children attend day school.
2) Home Ritual
The study finds that those who have a bank of Jewish memories are more likely to repeat the behaviors those memories are based on. This makes abundant common sense. If you can’t play the piano, do you really identify as a pianist? Do you believe yourself capable of things you have no personal, repeated experience of doing? In order to BE Jewish, one must know how to DO Jewish.
For those who remember the scent of challah baking, the excitement of staying up for Shavuot, making decorations for the sukkah, there is the desire and knowledge to repeat them in adulthood. These practices from childhood are no less powerful than the memories associated with Christmas. We must stock up the Jewish bank with Jewish capital.
Side note: You may be aware that scientists have found that the sense of smell is our longest carrier of memories. In other words, you can smell something from your past and it will arouse a memory better and longer than visual or auditory stimuli. Interestingly this carrying over to smell’s companion sense - taste. Immigrants retain the cuisine of their home culture even after assimilating in other ways to the dominate culture. I frequently encourage my interfaith couples to integrate sensory Jewish experiences into their lives.
3) Social Networks
This study states that having Jewish friends increased the likelihood that an individual will engage in Jewish life and practice.
Studies in all the social sciences report the power of peer influence. A recent study on Early Childhood Education looked at what causes parents to put their children in Jewish preschools. They found the number one factor was the actions of their friends. They titled this: Peer Influence.
What causes kids to join gangs? What supports alcoholics in remaining “dry”? The support and influence of a peer group.
Chertok/Saxe state it brilliantly:
Having Jewish friends growing up and especially in high school may help make Jewish identity and home ritual normative. Jewish summer camps, youth movements, and campus organizations provide environments in which to enact Jewish values and practice Jewish behaviors with peers. Without opportunities for social comparison with a group of Jewish friends, teens and young adults may come to believe that acting out one’s Jewish identity is potentially uncomfortable and isolating.
(The bold is my emphasis.) This is no different from all “fitting in” behaviors of normal human beings. Whether our couple is JJ or IF, they need Jewish friends for all of the above reasons.
From this study, we can readily conclude that by increasing EDUCATION, HOME RITUAL, and SOCIAL NETWORKS we can positively influence JJ and IF couples to become comfortable with Jewish life and encourage them to embrace and deepen their Jewish practice.
Recommendations to the community
The question that simply leaps off the page is:
If interfaith families in a Reform environment become like Reform Jews, do interfaith families in a Conservative environment become like Conservative Jews?
Are interfaith couples being assimilate into the Jewish community in which they live?
The question can be extended to interfaith couples in an Orthodox environment and a secular environment.
A colleague of mine who was the non-Jewish partner (she has since converted) in a Conservative congregation and participated in a self study that the bay area Conservative moment did of interfaith in their congregations said, “Interfaith families in the Conservative moment know what they are getting into and make the choice to go for greater practice.”
Additionally, I know an interfaith couple at a local Orthodox congregation who is kosher and shomer Shabbos.
We, the on the ground professionals, must press the demographers to explore this vital finding. Perhaps Steven Cohen, a Conservative Jew, would be able to help. Key to the Saxe study is a survey done of the Reform movement’s lay leaders. Perhaps Steve Cohen would know of a comparable study from the Conservative movement that could be used with the 2000 NJPS and the data from Birthright.
ACTION ITEMS
1) Jewish education
Since the 1990 NJPS the community’s focus has been on Jewish education and many studies say it is paying off. But Jewish education must be better, cheaper and longer.
The VAST MAJORITY of our children are educated in synagogue Hebrew schools. These schools have teachers who are not credentialed, poorly paid, part-time and sometimes barely ahead of their students.
Synagogues are perennially short of money, staff and time. Until Jewish funders stop worrying about denominations and movements and put real money into the synagogue schools that are actually educating most Jewish children, we will continue to have inadequately educated Jews. We will continue to lose the struggle to retain a generation.
2) Home ritual
Adult Jews must be provided with the skills and knowledge to practice at home. But that will most likely start outside their home. They need classes that are fun, meaningful and transformative. Here is where Outreach is essential. Our programs are often labeled as NOT supporting the core of born Jews. But we know differently. We have to start collecting the statistics that show the number of shy and ambivalent Jews that utilize our entry point programs to come in. They are often more comfortable in the presence of some non-Jews whom they expect to be less knowledgeable than themselves and therefore, less threatening.
3) Social Networks
In this hideously busy world it is hard to build relationships. Chavurot, classes, and other ongoing multi-session programs are needed to create time and opportunity for individuals to connect. In a couples group or a class setting, people get to know each other over discussion of shared interests and concerns. Outreach programs offer unaffiliated couples and families these bridging opportunities.
I ran a one-year chavura for unaffiliated interfaith families three years ago. They were one of the most disengaged groups I have ever experienced. But they clicked and they continue to meet. Several of them have since joined congregations and I hope their influence will draw in, or at least support, the remaining couples. Time and repetition has an amazing power.
I also used to form chavurot in a synagogue environment 20 years ago. Those chavurot remain intact and the families have not left the synagogue as their children aged and are now leaving home.
Where Do We, the Outreach Professionals, Fit In?
There are no street signs saying, “This way to be Jewish.” There is no section of the Yellow pages in my community that is labeled “Jewish.” In fact, the synagogues in my area are listed under CHURCHES.
The Outreach Professional creates a bridge between the unaffiliated and Jewish life. Our ads in secular media, our websites, our programs - are all entry points to participation.
A community without an Outreach professional is a community without a guide. The Outreach professional functions as the hub to all possible points of engagement for the uninformed seeker - Jewish or not yet Jewish.
I want to look beyond the headlines. This is not a rosy affirmation that interfaith couples turn out to be just like Jewish - Jewish couples.
What is the study saying?
Yes, interfaith couples, when you control for Jewish education level, look very much like JJ couples in the Reform movement.
But look closely, the JJ couples don’t look so good. This is a bit like saying people with pneumonia don’t look any worse than people with the plague.
Looking at the levels of observance and practice studied we see low numbers for both groups.
Very emotionally attached to Israel
JJ couples 17% IF couples 16%
Any Jewish organizational ties
JJ couples 54% IF couples 57%
Usually light Shabbat candles
JJ couples 13% IF couples 12%
Very important to be Jewish
JJ couples 37% IF couples 29%
In essence, this is a startling revelation of the low level of the Reform Jews’ engagement with Jewish life.
But don’t throw in the towel, there is also good news.
Chertok/Saxe identify three critical elements to Jewish engagement.
1) Jewish Education
Remember that all of the above statistics are based on “controlling for education.” That is, a poorly educated Jew, no matter who they marry, doesn’t do much Jewishly. A well educated Jew, no matter who they marry, does – or is significantly more likely to.
As one highly educated Jew in my community put it, “I painted a very orthodox picture of life with me to my (now) husband when we were talking about marriage.” Indeed, she and her husband and children are synagogue affiliated, active in Federation, and the children attend day school.
2) Home Ritual
The study finds that those who have a bank of Jewish memories are more likely to repeat the behaviors those memories are based on. This makes abundant common sense. If you can’t play the piano, do you really identify as a pianist? Do you believe yourself capable of things you have no personal, repeated experience of doing? In order to BE Jewish, one must know how to DO Jewish.
For those who remember the scent of challah baking, the excitement of staying up for Shavuot, making decorations for the sukkah, there is the desire and knowledge to repeat them in adulthood. These practices from childhood are no less powerful than the memories associated with Christmas. We must stock up the Jewish bank with Jewish capital.
Side note: You may be aware that scientists have found that the sense of smell is our longest carrier of memories. In other words, you can smell something from your past and it will arouse a memory better and longer than visual or auditory stimuli. Interestingly this carrying over to smell’s companion sense - taste. Immigrants retain the cuisine of their home culture even after assimilating in other ways to the dominate culture. I frequently encourage my interfaith couples to integrate sensory Jewish experiences into their lives.
3) Social Networks
This study states that having Jewish friends increased the likelihood that an individual will engage in Jewish life and practice.
Studies in all the social sciences report the power of peer influence. A recent study on Early Childhood Education looked at what causes parents to put their children in Jewish preschools. They found the number one factor was the actions of their friends. They titled this: Peer Influence.
What causes kids to join gangs? What supports alcoholics in remaining “dry”? The support and influence of a peer group.
Chertok/Saxe state it brilliantly:
Having Jewish friends growing up and especially in high school may help make Jewish identity and home ritual normative. Jewish summer camps, youth movements, and campus organizations provide environments in which to enact Jewish values and practice Jewish behaviors with peers. Without opportunities for social comparison with a group of Jewish friends, teens and young adults may come to believe that acting out one’s Jewish identity is potentially uncomfortable and isolating.
(The bold is my emphasis.) This is no different from all “fitting in” behaviors of normal human beings. Whether our couple is JJ or IF, they need Jewish friends for all of the above reasons.
From this study, we can readily conclude that by increasing EDUCATION, HOME RITUAL, and SOCIAL NETWORKS we can positively influence JJ and IF couples to become comfortable with Jewish life and encourage them to embrace and deepen their Jewish practice.
Recommendations to the community
The question that simply leaps off the page is:
If interfaith families in a Reform environment become like Reform Jews, do interfaith families in a Conservative environment become like Conservative Jews?
Are interfaith couples being assimilate into the Jewish community in which they live?
The question can be extended to interfaith couples in an Orthodox environment and a secular environment.
A colleague of mine who was the non-Jewish partner (she has since converted) in a Conservative congregation and participated in a self study that the bay area Conservative moment did of interfaith in their congregations said, “Interfaith families in the Conservative moment know what they are getting into and make the choice to go for greater practice.”
Additionally, I know an interfaith couple at a local Orthodox congregation who is kosher and shomer Shabbos.
We, the on the ground professionals, must press the demographers to explore this vital finding. Perhaps Steven Cohen, a Conservative Jew, would be able to help. Key to the Saxe study is a survey done of the Reform movement’s lay leaders. Perhaps Steve Cohen would know of a comparable study from the Conservative movement that could be used with the 2000 NJPS and the data from Birthright.
ACTION ITEMS
1) Jewish education
Since the 1990 NJPS the community’s focus has been on Jewish education and many studies say it is paying off. But Jewish education must be better, cheaper and longer.
The VAST MAJORITY of our children are educated in synagogue Hebrew schools. These schools have teachers who are not credentialed, poorly paid, part-time and sometimes barely ahead of their students.
Synagogues are perennially short of money, staff and time. Until Jewish funders stop worrying about denominations and movements and put real money into the synagogue schools that are actually educating most Jewish children, we will continue to have inadequately educated Jews. We will continue to lose the struggle to retain a generation.
2) Home ritual
Adult Jews must be provided with the skills and knowledge to practice at home. But that will most likely start outside their home. They need classes that are fun, meaningful and transformative. Here is where Outreach is essential. Our programs are often labeled as NOT supporting the core of born Jews. But we know differently. We have to start collecting the statistics that show the number of shy and ambivalent Jews that utilize our entry point programs to come in. They are often more comfortable in the presence of some non-Jews whom they expect to be less knowledgeable than themselves and therefore, less threatening.
3) Social Networks
In this hideously busy world it is hard to build relationships. Chavurot, classes, and other ongoing multi-session programs are needed to create time and opportunity for individuals to connect. In a couples group or a class setting, people get to know each other over discussion of shared interests and concerns. Outreach programs offer unaffiliated couples and families these bridging opportunities.
I ran a one-year chavura for unaffiliated interfaith families three years ago. They were one of the most disengaged groups I have ever experienced. But they clicked and they continue to meet. Several of them have since joined congregations and I hope their influence will draw in, or at least support, the remaining couples. Time and repetition has an amazing power.
I also used to form chavurot in a synagogue environment 20 years ago. Those chavurot remain intact and the families have not left the synagogue as their children aged and are now leaving home.
Where Do We, the Outreach Professionals, Fit In?
There are no street signs saying, “This way to be Jewish.” There is no section of the Yellow pages in my community that is labeled “Jewish.” In fact, the synagogues in my area are listed under CHURCHES.
The Outreach Professional creates a bridge between the unaffiliated and Jewish life. Our ads in secular media, our websites, our programs - are all entry points to participation.
A community without an Outreach professional is a community without a guide. The Outreach professional functions as the hub to all possible points of engagement for the uninformed seeker - Jewish or not yet Jewish.
Tuesday, March 18, 2008
Reflections on the URJ Biennial & the Coming Study
From the Biennial
Some of us were at the presentation in San Diego at the URJ Biennial in Dec. 2007 by Fern Chertoff and Leonard Saxe on interfaith families. They presented a Powerpoint on their latest study "It's Not Just Who Stands Under the Chuppah." The core message of the study was that when you control for Jewish education level, interfaith families look pretty much like non-Orthodox Jewish inmarried families. (The study itself is due out this month.)
Now there are a LOT of questions that this brings up that I will save for another moment. AND it adds to the data that Bruce Phillips shared with me a couple years ago (and I shared with all of you) about the importance of Jewish education in the perpetuation of Judaism. Like everything else in life, if you don't know how to do it or why to do it, eventually, you don't do it anymore.
There was a point during the workshop in San Diego at which Debbie Antonoff of Pathways Atlanta wondered if what was being presented was saying that Outreach to interfaith couples is irrelevant? Is our work without merit if everything depends on the Jewish educational level of the Jew in the interfaith marriage? I would say firmly, No. I believe that we are like the high school counselors, if you don't know you can get an education, don't know how to get an education, don't think you can afford an education, or think that time for one has passed you by, then you won't even try. We are the high school and college counselors, the college recruiters that go out and tell people, you can, you have access, it's not too expensive, you have a right to it, you can do it whether you're married to a Jew or not -that is- you can become Jewishly educated and so can your children.
I was discussing this question with Rabbi Menachem Creditor (he used to be in Boston and is now at Netivot Shalom in Berkeley, CA). The metaphor we discussed was the individual who is the first in their family to seek a college education. That individual does not know how to navigate the system and needs help in finding their way through it. Additionally, there may be students who don't even know that a college education is a possibility and unless someone reaches out to them with information, support and encouragement, they will never attempt college.
Wisdom from another study/talk
I recently went to the Brandeis site and read a brief article by Saxe titled:
Connecting Diaspora Young Adult to Israel: Lessons from Taglit-Birthright Israel
He sums up his findings with these four points:
1. Young adult Jews want to be connected
2. people-to-people connections are essential
3. education has to involve all of the senses
4. institutions must change and adapt.
These lessons—and others that each of you could draw—are as important as the individual changes that the program has wrought.
These four statements can be said of our work in outreach to the interfaith. They want to be connected, the people-to-people connection is essential -- this goes back to Bruce Phillips' quote, "The most powerful influence on an interfaith couple’s decision to raise their children Jewish is one person reaching out and inviting them to participate in Jewish life." Education must engage the senses and our institutions must adapt.
I think the institutions are adapting, the ones that are not will die and be replaced by new ones. In the bay area Jewish Gateways is an experiential new program that is a working!
Take a look at Rabbi Bridget Wynne's Jewish Gateways site at www.jewishgateways.org
For those organizations that are actually educating the couples and their children, look to Stepping Stones, Phyllis Adler's program in Denver. For information on such programs, you can talk to Lynne Wolfe who ran Pathways in New Jersey for 13 years. I bet when this study comes out the MetroWest Federation will be kicking themselves.
More thoughts to come.
Some of us were at the presentation in San Diego at the URJ Biennial in Dec. 2007 by Fern Chertoff and Leonard Saxe on interfaith families. They presented a Powerpoint on their latest study "It's Not Just Who Stands Under the Chuppah." The core message of the study was that when you control for Jewish education level, interfaith families look pretty much like non-Orthodox Jewish inmarried families. (The study itself is due out this month.)
Now there are a LOT of questions that this brings up that I will save for another moment. AND it adds to the data that Bruce Phillips shared with me a couple years ago (and I shared with all of you) about the importance of Jewish education in the perpetuation of Judaism. Like everything else in life, if you don't know how to do it or why to do it, eventually, you don't do it anymore.
There was a point during the workshop in San Diego at which Debbie Antonoff of Pathways Atlanta wondered if what was being presented was saying that Outreach to interfaith couples is irrelevant? Is our work without merit if everything depends on the Jewish educational level of the Jew in the interfaith marriage? I would say firmly, No. I believe that we are like the high school counselors, if you don't know you can get an education, don't know how to get an education, don't think you can afford an education, or think that time for one has passed you by, then you won't even try. We are the high school and college counselors, the college recruiters that go out and tell people, you can, you have access, it's not too expensive, you have a right to it, you can do it whether you're married to a Jew or not -that is- you can become Jewishly educated and so can your children.
I was discussing this question with Rabbi Menachem Creditor (he used to be in Boston and is now at Netivot Shalom in Berkeley, CA). The metaphor we discussed was the individual who is the first in their family to seek a college education. That individual does not know how to navigate the system and needs help in finding their way through it. Additionally, there may be students who don't even know that a college education is a possibility and unless someone reaches out to them with information, support and encouragement, they will never attempt college.
Wisdom from another study/talk
I recently went to the Brandeis site and read a brief article by Saxe titled:
Connecting Diaspora Young Adult to Israel: Lessons from Taglit-Birthright Israel
He sums up his findings with these four points:
1. Young adult Jews want to be connected
2. people-to-people connections are essential
3. education has to involve all of the senses
4. institutions must change and adapt.
These lessons—and others that each of you could draw—are as important as the individual changes that the program has wrought.
These four statements can be said of our work in outreach to the interfaith. They want to be connected, the people-to-people connection is essential -- this goes back to Bruce Phillips' quote, "The most powerful influence on an interfaith couple’s decision to raise their children Jewish is one person reaching out and inviting them to participate in Jewish life." Education must engage the senses and our institutions must adapt.
I think the institutions are adapting, the ones that are not will die and be replaced by new ones. In the bay area Jewish Gateways is an experiential new program that is a working!
Take a look at Rabbi Bridget Wynne's Jewish Gateways site at www.jewishgateways.org
For those organizations that are actually educating the couples and their children, look to Stepping Stones, Phyllis Adler's program in Denver. For information on such programs, you can talk to Lynne Wolfe who ran Pathways in New Jersey for 13 years. I bet when this study comes out the MetroWest Federation will be kicking themselves.
More thoughts to come.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Posts
