Legacy Heritage Innovation Project: Integrating adult, family, and children’s learning in the context of Shabbat and holiday celebration

Many North American synagogues have embraced the concept of becoming “Shabbat-centered communities,” in effect making Shabbat the focal time for congregational engagement and education. This approach reflects a renewed interest in using Shabbat as a sacred time for creating and deepening a sense of community and Jewish identity.

A Shabbat and holiday based approach to family learning builds upon the core of many congregations and traditional Jewish practice, integrating many different aspects of congregational life and Jewish practice. This approach provides a common, replicable framework for making Jewish education more systemic and integrated on a variety of planes, in that it:

• roots children’s and adult learning in a context of shared Jewish practice, deepening its meaning for learners;

• instills consistent Jewish practice as a habit of family life from early childhood;

• links parents and children not only with families of similar ages, but also with congregants of different life stages, strengthening the community as a whole and providing models for life-long Jewish engagement; and

• deepens the experience of bar/bat mitzvah for these families, enabling them (both before and after that central lifecycle celebration) to develop a greater sense of connection to Jewish practice and their congregational Shabbat community

Legacy Heritage Innovation Project Grants

The Legacy Heritage Innovation Project will award grants of up to $30,000 to synagogues which on a regular basis are integrating adult, family, and children’s education into home or communal congregational Shabbat and holiday practice, developing models and “best practices” which might be replicated or adapted for use by other congregations. The funding is intended to help the congregation develop the educational initiative under the supervision of the congregational leadership team. In addition, those congregations selected as recipients will be eligible to apply for multi-year funding of up to $30,000 per year for up to three additional years.

Recipients will be obligated to:
• Dedicate at least one-third of the proposed budget (i.e. ~ $10,000) to training, coaching, or consultation for the staff and congregational leadership on systemic congregational change through a Jewish family educational perspective. Examples of appropriate use of such funds would be:

• engaging a professional consultant, coach or mentor to work with staff and lay leadership throughout the year on a strategic plan for implementing long-range systemic change (Legacy Heritage Innovation Project will offer a list of potential organizations and consultants for this purpose);

• hiring a consultant to help plan and lead a retreat or series of retreats for the board or other leaders;

• subsidizing a team of senior staff to attend a special training track for Innovation Project grantees with the Consortium for the Future of the Jewish Family: Expanding the Work of Whizin, at the annual CAJE Conference in the summer of 2008, focusing on synagogues through the lens of family, institutional transformation, and family education strategies.

• Devote approximately ten per cent of the funding (~ $3,000) to evaluating the initiative.

• Provide $2,000 in matching funding from the synagogue’s operating budget.

• Send both the congregation’s rabbi and lead educator to the Innovation Project seminar in the New York area from Monday, June 2 through Wednesday, June 4, 2008. The Legacy Heritage Innovation Project will cover room and board, materials, and programming; the congregation is responsible for transportation costs (this cost is in addition to the required $2,000 matching funding).

• Submit mid- and end-of-year reports substantiating progress towards stated objectives.
Priority for grants will be given to proposals designed to:

• Significantly increase the engagement of parents (or other caregivers) and children in Jewish learning and living. Preference will be given to proposals involving parental participation at least twice per month.

• Root parents’ and children’s learning in the context of familial and communal practice of Shabbat and the Jewish holiday cycle.

• Leverage the family-based initiative with other aspects of the congregation’s programming to yield greater synergy and integration.

• Align programming with the congregational vision.

• Reflect and promote collaborative leadership among staff and lay leaders.

• Support systemic congregational change rather than programmatic innovation (see note below).

• Develop and enhance existing innovations in ways which can be replicated or adapted for other settings.