2Outreachs xc N A T I O N A L J E W I S H VOL 22 NO. DECEMBER 2011 l KISLEV 5772 N E W S L E T T E R NJOP Honors Shabbat s Foremost Spokesperson By Ephraim Z. Buchwald It is a distinct privilege to announce that the Guests of Honor at this year's Eighteenth Annual NJOP Dinner will be the distinguished Senator from Connecticut, Joseph I. Lieberman and his wife, Photograph by Doris Levin Hadassah. Honored along with them will be the world famous surgeon, Dr. David Samadi and his wife, Sahar Danielpour, Diane and Rabbi Daniel Cohen of Congregation Agudath Sholom, Stamford, CT, who will be receiving the Leslie Nelkin Special Service Award, and Susan Hecht and David Cohen who will be presented with the Carl and Sylvia Freyer Young Leadership Award. When we heard that Senator Lieberman was publishing a new book entitled, "The Gift of Rest: Rediscovering the Beauty of the Sabbath" we knew that we had a The 18th Annual Dinner Shabbat: The Eternal Covenant February 13, 2012 21 Shevat 5772 Grand Hyatt New York Guests of Honor Hadassah and Senator Joseph I. Lieberman are outstanding examples of Jews who are dedicated to honoring Jewish values. NJOP is thrilled that the Senator and Hadassah have agreed to be Guests of Honor at this year's Annual Dinner. In honor of Senator Lieberman's new book, The Gift of Rest: Rediscovering the Beauty of the Sabbath, this year's Dinner theme is: Shabbat: The Eternal Covenant. NJOP is also most proud to be honoring Sahar Danielpour and Dr. David B. Samadi. Natives of Iran, they currently reside in Old Westbury, and they are active members of Temple Beth Shalom in Roslyn, N.Y. Dr. Samadi, a world-renowned urologist and surgeon, is the Vice Chairman, Department of Urology, and Chief of Robotics and Minimally Invasive Surgery at the Mount Sinai Medical Center in New York City. CONTINUED ON PAGE 6 Carl & Sylvia Freyer Young Leadership Award Susan Hecht and David Cohen are both native New Yorkers who enjoy playing an active part in the broader New York Jewish community. David works for a Chelsea-based software company, while Susan, a tax attorney, now dedicates her time to raising their ten-month old son, Philip. Leslie Nelkin Special Service Award Diane and Rabbi Daniel Cohen are an integral part of the Stamford, CT, Jewish community. Rabbi Cohen is the much beloved spiritual leader of Congregation Agudath Sholom and has been closely affiliated with NJOP for more than 15 years. Diane Cohen, a personal organization specialist, actively assists her husband with a multiplicity of community matters. CONTINUED ON PAGE 6 CONTINUED
CREATING RELEVANT AND EXCITING HIGH HOLIDAYS More and more, synagogues turn to NJOP for innovative ways to attract unaffiliated Jews to their High Holiday Services. NJOP staff members respond to calls from rabbis and community leaders, often suggesting NJOP s [pre-] High Holiday Prayer Workshop, which enables participants to understand and appreciate the meaning and significance of the prayers. NJOP works hard to help the synagogues design and create a Beginners Service program that best suits the needs of their communities. In 2011, more than 50 locations offered successful High Holiday Beginners Services (HHBS), drawing on NJOP s extensive programming materials. Below are excerpts from an interview with Azi Cutter, who led one such successful High Holiday Beginners Service in Long Beach, New York. Q: Please describe the nature of your HHBS. A: I began running the Beginners Service three years ago. For two years, we held the Services in the basement of our synagogue, the Bach Jewish Center of Long Beach. When the 5-star Allegria Hotel opened overlooking the ocean, my rabbi, Eli Goodman, saw this as a great opportunity to attract more people. We partnered with the Manhattan Jewish Experience (MJE) and hosted two of their senior educators. Congregants were impressed with their unique style and enjoyed their wit and Torah insights. The mix of transliterated ArtScroll Hebrew, English prayers, Q & A, singing and dancing made it an uplifting and unique service. At one point during Rosh Hashana, almost everyone was dancing, and we concluded services with apples, honey, POMtini cocktails and gelato. We expanded our Yom Kippur services by offering Kol Nidrei, daytime, and Ne ilah services, concluding with a spirited havdalah and gala break-fast. Our Beginners Service was a huge success with more than 400 adults in attendance and 70 children in our childrens program. Q: How did you attract people and what did you do to market the Services? A: We created a marketing campaign that paralleled the Allegria Hotel s look and feel. We also designed an attractive website (allegriahighholidays.com) with pictures of the hotel lounge and ballroom. Online registration was encouraged. We mailed postcards, placed large signs in stores, took out a full page color ad in a local newspaper, and rented a booth at a festival in Long Beach. The response was overwhelming. Q: What motivated you to become involved with Jewish outreach? A: For many years, I was a board member at MJE, led by Rabbi Mark Wildes. Steve Eisenberg, a devoted NJOP and MJE volunteer, encouraged me to help him run an outreach Passover seder. The seder was a huge success, and I was hooked. Both Steve and Rabbi Wildes were mentored by Rabbi Buchwald. They constantly quote him and model their teaching based on NJOP s philosophy and methodologies. Q: How did Steve Eisenberg and NJOP s Program Director, Larry Greenman, help you prepare to lead the service? A: Steve and I spent countless hours reviewing the materials, with insights into the tefillot, and great suggestions on how to engage the congregation. He taught me how to lead the service, when to tell a joke, and how to weave my personal life into discussions. Larry Greenman and I brainstormed on how to organize the service and make it user-friendly with NJOP s outstanding materials. Q: Which NJOP materials did you use in your Beginners Service? A: I designed the services around the NJOP Abridged High Holiday Beginners Service outline and it was very helpful. We used NJOP s Priceless Appeal Cards and they were a HUGE hit. Congregants folded the flaps of the programs in which they were interested and then we followed up after the holidays. I was thrilled to see that on almost 80% of the cards, participants chose our explanatory [Shabbat] services. These cards are critical to knowing which programs will keep them coming back. 2
READ HEBREW AMERICA 2011 READ HEBREW AMERICA (RHA), NJOP s annual fall Hebrew literacy campaign, took place at hundreds of locations across North America, where thousands of Jews learned to read the Aleph Bet at a Hebrew Reading Crash Course (HRCC). In this way, NJOP provided these Jews, many of whom have no synagogue affiliation, with an important link to the Jewish community and the beauty of their Jewish heritage. HRCC graduates at Congregation Ahavas Chesed, Mobile, AL To enhance this year s RHA experience and promote the annual literacy campaign, NJOP introduced its new Hebrew Names campaign. The program, which is being promoted through NJOP s Jewish Treats/JewishTweets, was launched with a special post on The Huffington Post, the premiere news blog site. Throughout the month of November, NJOP emailed an additional Daily Treat exploring the background and meaning of different Hebrew names. Each of the names chosen is the original Hebrew version of a name listed among the 100 most popular names of 2011 as compiled by the United States Social Security Administration. Rabbi Ze ev Kraines of Sandton, South Africa with HRCC graduates Participants in HRCC, Ft. Benning, GA Since names are the root of our identities, it is NJOP s belief that understanding the meaning and relevence of one s Hebrew name will help Jews further connect to their roots. Additionally, a supplemental class on the role of Hebrew names in Jewish life, how Hebrew names are chosen and the unique backgrounds of several common Hebrew names, was provided to each RHA teacher to share with their Hebrew class. SHABBAT ACROSS AMERICA Energized by the success of last year s SHABBAT ACROSS AMERICA (SAA) 512 locations! and the over 300,000 viewers of NJOP s I ve Got a Feeling The Shabbat Song video NJOP is already signing up participating locations for its annual cross-continental Shabbat celebration which will take place on Friday night, March 2, 2012. Are there secrets to the success of SAA? Rabbis on an NJOP best practices conference call reported that local success often featured special hometown themes that attracted broader audiences. For instance, one synagogue hosted a Fiddler themed Shabbat and decorated its social hall to look like a shtetl. Another synagogue invited Hebrew school children to lead its SAA program, thereby attracting the parents. Here s what people are saying:...usually we have only 20 people for davening. This Shabbat it WAS PACKED. (This synagogue then participated in PASSOVER ACROSS AMERICA.) Moses Montefiore Anshe Emunah Congregation, Baltimore, MD SAA is both an outreach and an in-reach program at this JCC: 50 of our 190 attendees were non-members! And, for many members, SAA represents one of a very small number of our annual Shabbat celebrations. It s a wonderful program from which our extended community benefits greatly. Yasher Koach. (Some members have since expressed interest in hosting an SAA-like program two or three times a year.) Jewish Community Center, Paramus, NJ SHABBAT ACROSS AMERICA 2012 will take place on Friday, March 2nd 3
NJOP Volunteer Writes Fascinating New Book On Marc Chagall Vivian (Chaviva) Jacobson is the author of Sharing Chagall: A Memoir, in which she traces her 11-year association with the famous Jewish artist. Chaviva first became involved with NJOP through READ HEBREW AMERICA at The Sandhills Jewish Congregation in Pinehurst, N.C. At the time, she had been teaching a Hebrew class to Christians who wanted to study the bible in its original Hebrew. But Chaviva also wanted to teach Hebrew to Jewish people, and in an unusual turn of events, the organization that sponsored the Christian class told her about NJOP! Chaviva taught the Hebrew Reading Crash Course for two years, and her congregation has participated in SHABBAT ACROSS AMERICA for 10 years. We loved the idea that on one Friday night each year, our small Jewish congregation could be united with hundreds of other congregations in the U.S. NJOP brings people back to their Yiddishkeit... Chaviva said. To find out more about her book, go to vivianjacobson.com Sarah Rochel Hewitt: NJOP s Writer Extraordinaire Sarah Rochel Hewitt knew as early as high school that Judaism and writing were her dual passions. But she never imagined that she would find a way to combine the two professionally. Fortunately, it did not take long after she joined the National Jewish Outreach Program in November of 1999 in an administrative capacity, for NJOP to discover her abundant talents and put them to good use. The first written project Sarah Rochel worked on was NJOP s continually popular Complete Guide to Holidays. Rabbi Buchwald and Beryl Levenson asked me to put something together about Passover for the website. I think they were both surprised when I handed them a 14 page guide, Sarah Rochel reminisced. Since becoming NJOP s Publications Coordinator, Sarah Rochel has helped to create some of the most enduring of NJOP s acclaimed materials. Working in conjunction with NJOP s editorial board, headed by Rabbi Ephraim Buchwald and Rabbi Yitzchak Rosenbaum, she wrote the Companion Guide to NJOP s Crash Course in Basic Judaism and helped to develop the Crash Course in Jewish History and its Companion Guide, as well. Other examples of her exceptional work are the Spiritulity At Your Fingertips series, programming materials for the annual SHABBAT ACROSS AMERICA campaign, and a great deal of the content for the NJOP website. In 2008, soon after the launch of NJOP s Jewish Treats, Juicy Bits of Judaism, Daily, Sarah Rochel took over as author and editor of this daily email which includes a daily Jewish fact, action and prayer. Today, Jewish Treats continues to grow in popularity - over 2,700 people receive Jewish Treats in their email inbox every business day and thousands more receive a daily link to the blog via @JewishTweets and Facebook. About the daunting task of writing a fresh and exciting email every day, Sarah Rochel says, It s exciting to find new angles and approaches to share Judaism with people, and to find new ways to excite not only the public about Judaism, but myself as well. Under the Jewish Treats umbrella, Sarah Rochel has also written a series of ebooks about major Jewish holidays. She especially enjoys this opportunity to dig deeper and expand upon some of the original Jewish Treats. Adding stories to facts, and painting a more complete picture of the holidays, is an adventure she relishes. Recently, Sarah Rochel has brought the ideas developed in Jewish Treats to the Huffington Post s Religion Page under the name S.R. Hewitt. This exciting development will allow Sarah Rochel to share interesting insights into Judaism with an entirely new audience of readers. Raised in Pennsylvania, Sarah Rochel graduated the University of Maryland @ College Park with a double degree in English and Jewish Studies and followed that with a Masters in Education from Brooklyn College. Today, she is more than a little busy. In addition to her work with NJOP, all of which is done remotely from her home in Montreal, Canada, she is the mother of four children, who can often be heard chiming in on lateafternoon conference calls. As busy as she is, however, writing about Judaism is a labor of love for her. I find Judaism fascinating, she says. Thanks to her, thousands of readers every day agree. 4
The objective of NJOP s social media strategy is to reach and engage fans and followers with Jewish education and news, connecting them with Judaism and with each other in a powerful way - not just once, but countless times on a daily basis. WEBINARS & WEBISODES Using modern technology to help our partners make better and more effective use of NJOP programs and resources, NJOP hosted several interactive webinars for rabbis and program coordinators. During a highly successsful Passover Seder Webinar, Rabbi Buchwald offered his time-tested recommendations on how to conduct a meaningful and uplifting seder, followed by a lively Q & A. NJOP has offered two other leadership webinars: How to Teach the Hebrew Reading Crash Course and How to Lead a High Holiday Beginners Service. These webinars enhance the relationship with NJOP s partners by assisting them in their efforts to engage more people in their own communities. NJOP also uses internet video tools to reach out to the community. In addition to our successful YouTube videos, 15 webisodes featuring Rabbi Buchwald, provided a basic background to the seder ritual and demonstrated how to conduct an exciting and meaningful seder. Viewers were able to experience the dynamic quality that Rabbi Buchwald injects into Beginners programming. The successful webisode format was repeated with four special Shavuot webisodes. AS SEEN ON... TODAY NJOP has become a social media phenomenon. This year, just before Passover, NJOP s newest video, Best Seder in the USA, debuted with more than 71,000 views on YouTube. Additionally, many thousands of new viewers were introduced to NJOP when Best Seder in the USA was featured on NBC s Today Show as an example of the use of state-of-the art viral videos to teach Jews about the holiday of Passover. NJOP s Soul Bigger video was highly successful when it first appeared before the 2010 High Holidays, and it is still racking up hits on YouTube. This September, it, too, was featured on Today as one of their Webtastic internet videos that you ll want to share with your entire contact list. Today s unsolicited recommendation helped the video reach 135,000 viewers by Yom Kippur, an increase of almost 100,000 over last year...and the viewers keep on clicking. In addition to the millions of people who watched it on Today, more than 150,000 people have viewed it on YouTube to date. I ve Got a Feeling The Shabbat Song is a spirited video created in March 2010 to help promote SHABBAT ACROSS AMERICA. With more than 310,000 views on YouTube, it continues to gain in popularity as followers spread the joy of Shabbat by sharing NJOP s video each Friday. Even as you read this newsletter, we are connecting more Jews with Judaism as they enjoy our online videos one click at a time. epublications NJOP has expanded its Jewish Treats brand by offering special epublications for both Passover and Shavuot. The Jewish Treats Guide to Preparing a Passover Seder was devised as a tool to help the uninitiated become familiar with the seder. Jewish Treats: The Ten Commandments, created for Shavuot and downloaded by over 400 people in two days, offered one unique Treat on each of the Ten Commandments. Since last Chanukah, NJOP has published five Holiday and Shabbat related ebooks. Be sure to download our Jewish Treats Complete Guide to Chanukah at http://njop.org/chanukah-ebook/ 5
NJOP HONORS...CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1 "soulmate" in our midst who deserved to be acknowledged. Senator Lieberman is not new to the National Jewish Outreach Program. He addressed our NJOP Dinner by video in 1999 when his mother, of blessed memory, Mrs. Marcia Lieberman, was honored together with the B.L. Manger Foundation. The Manger Foundation, on whose board Senator Lieberman sat, had been most helpful to us during NJOP's founding years. Senator Lieberman also sent a special recorded message to his mother when she appeared in the fabled "Great Mothers" program, sponsored by NJOP on October 25, 1999. Mrs. Lieberman spoke cogently and passionately about her son, the Senator. Senator Lieberman is not only a great American politician, valiantly representing the interests of the State of Connecticut and the American people both nationally and internationally, he also is a true walkingtalking Kiddush Hashem, sanctifying the name of G-d throughout the world for many years. The stories of his commitment to Judaism are legion. In order to be present for an important vote that took place on Shabbat, the Senator once planned to sleep on a cot in the Senate gym. At the last minute, he was invited to stay at Senator Al Gore's parents' Capital Hill townhouse. He also insisted on walking on Shabbat, rather than riding in a car, when, as the Vice Presidential nominee with Senator Gore, he was needed at an urgent meeting. And with regard to his deep and abiding commitment to the State of Israel, he is in a class by himself. Now Senator Lieberman has taken all of this one step further with his new Shabbat book, "The Gift of Rest," in which he extolls the virtues of Shabbat and advocates on its behalf to members of all faiths. How beautifully this dovetails with NJOP's efforts to promote Shabbat observance through its acclaimed SHABBAT ACROSS AMERICA campaign. Throughout the years, NJOP has proudly proclaimed that "sanctified time" is desperately needed for families, declaring that there can be no "quality time" without "quantity time." NJOP is eager to give the Liebermans the recognition they truly deserve for serving as spokespeople for the Sabbath day, for which they have now become the world's foremost ambassadors. May Hashem bless the Senator and his family and all our Crash Course In Basic Judaism The Sixth Street Synagogue in Manhattan, led by Rabbi Greg Wall ( The Jazz Rabbi ), was host of this year s annual Crash Course in Basic Judaism (CCBJ). Rabbi Ephraim Z. Buchwald s fascinating five lecture presentation exploring the basics of Judaism, sponsored for the 10th consecutive year by The David Berg Foundation, was attended by more than 60 people. Rabbi Buchwald not only motivated those in the process of exploring Judaism, but also introduced this unique synagogue to Jews who had never been there before. National Jewish Outreach Program 989 Sixth Avenue, 10th Floor, New York, NY 10018 646-871-4444 l 800-44-HEBRE(W) l info@njop.org l www.njop.org NJOP Board Members Marc Belzberg Ludwig Bravmann Valerie T. Diker Brandon Dunn Fred Ehrman Alec Ellison Adam E. Fine Sylvia Freyer Tracy Gerber Bernard Goldberg Hillel A. Gross Howard I. Hoffen Ilan Kaufthal Dr. Elizabeth Konecky Jack Nash, k z George Rohr Marc Rowan Eli Salig Lawrence Saper Cyrus Schwartz Leonard Shaykin Saul Spitz Moshael Straus Jeffrey I. Zuckerman NJOP Staff Founder and Director: Ephraim Z. Buchwald Beryl Levenson Associate Director Emeritus Levon Arutyunov Database Manager Rivka Bornstein Producation Coordinator Renee S. Erreich Events Coordinator Sofiya Ginzburg Administrative Associate Lawrence Greenman Program Director Amy Gugig IT Director Yitzchak Rosenbaum Associate Director Jessica Hanfling Assistant to the Director Sarah Rochel Hewitt Publications Coordinator Lois Karp Locations Coordinator Helen Koenig Donor Registrar Esther Langer Financials Honorees. We hope that our loyal supporters will not miss what promises to be a most outstanding and memorable occasion. We look forward to seeing you on February 13th. Rabbi Buchwald and Sam Domb enjoying last year s Dinner. Join them this year. Florence Wiener Hebrew Reading Specialist Susanne Goldstone Rosenhouse Social Media Professional Freeda Rudman Senior Assistant to the Director Chava Blumenthal Naomi Robin Lea Schulman Regional Program Coordinators Evana Arazi Janice Klein Avraham Silbergleit Production Associates 6
Paul J. Taubman Dedicates SUKKOT ACROSS AMERICA & PASSOVER ACROSS AMERICA * In Memory Of His Father, Joseph L. Taubman SUKKOT ACROSS AMERICA 2011 was celebrated by over 4,400 people at 67 synagogues, Hillels and Jewish centers in 25 states. The program attracted Jews from all walks of life, including students from over 20 college campuses. They were introduced to the sukkah experience, and many shook a lulav and etrog for the very first time! QUOTABLE QUOTES: About 45 people attended our Sukkah party. 100% of them would not have been able to celebrate Sukkot if not for the SUKKOT ACROSS AMERICA program. This was one of our most successful events to date, as students came from a diverse cross-section of our Jewish constituency on campus. It was a great opportunity for Jewish students to meet one another [to form] friendships. Adina Hemley, Director of the Inland & Desert Region Hillel Council, Riverside, CA Of the 45 people who attended, 10 were newcomers, and all but five would probably not have sat in a sukkah if not for our program. The event had a Mexican theme and was called Fajitas in the Casitas. There was even a piñata! Although the event was scheduled from 6:30-8:30 pm, our guests had such a nice time that they stayed until 9:30 pm! Many said that they had not been in a sukkah in years, and so appreciated the warmth and comfortable atmosphere. Tamar Livingstone, MEOR Program, Northwestern U., Evanston, IL These are just a few of the comments from the well over 50 adults and children from families across the spectrum of Jewish life in Indianapolis who attended Etz Chaim Sephardic Congregation s Sukkot Family Fun Day : Rabbi, you really pulled off a great event. I can t believe that this is free. Please let us know of more upcoming events - we d like to participate! Rabbi Dr. Eytan Cowen, Etz Chaim Sephardic Congregation, Indianapolis, IN PASSOVER ACROSS AMERICA This year, PASSOVER ACROSS AMERICA (PAA) attracted record numbers. A total of 46 synagogues and outreach centers participated in 38 cities across 17 states. Almost 3,800 people of all ages participated in 67 inspiring explanatory sedarim, attracting mostly unaffiliated and marginally affiliated Jews - an increase of almost 500 participants from last year! Taking Passover to the next generation, NJOP once again worked with a wide range of talented and engaging professionals to create PAA experiences on college campuses. This year, PAA sedarim were held at or near 17 college campuses. The seder was unbelievable! I found the NJOP materials and Rabbi Buchwald s pre-pesach webinar extremely helpful...the founder of the Charlotte Torah Center, a sharp-minded entrepreneur who has been taking learning more seriously during the past few months, said that the seder was epic. The passion and elation we felt at the seder is hard to convey in writing. Rabbi Chanoch Oppenheim, Charlotte Torah Center, Charlotte, NC We had brand new families attending this year, including the CEO of the Dallas Jewish Federation and her family. She had a great time and said Thank you!! We loved it!! A single mom and her four children stayed until the end...not only did two of her boys take off from school for Yom Tov, [joining] us for services [but] the oldest wants to start [studying] with me. Rabbi Shlomo Abrams, D.A.T.A., Far North Dallas, TX *SUKKOT ACROSS AMERICA and PASSOVER ACROSS AMERICA were inspired by Mr. Sam Domb. 7
National Jewish Outreach Program 989 Sixth Avenue, 10th Floor, New York, NY 10018 NON-PROFIT ORG. U.S. POSTAGE PAID Newburgh, NY Permit No.252 HERE S WHERE YOU CAN FIND NJOP ONLINE WWW.NJOP.ORG www.jewishtreats.org JEWISH FACEBOOK.COM/JEWISHTREATS TWITTER.COM/JEWISHTREETS YOUTUBE.COM/JEWISHTREATS Words of Torah for everyone! To receive Rabbi Buchwald s exciting and thought-provoking weekly email message, please send an email to: ezbuchwald@njop.org To receive a juicy bit of Judaism, daily, from Jewish Treats, please send an email to: jewishtreats@njop.org Mark Your Calendar NJOP s 18th Annual Dinner February 13, 2012 21 Shevat 5772 Grand Hyatt New York For Reservations or More Information: Renee Erreich 646-871-0111 renee@njop.org www.njop.org 8