The Jewish Educator’s Distance-Learning Handbook

By Rena Yehuda Newman April 9, 2021

Best-practices gleaned from a new generation of Jewish Educators, making the Zoom makom meaningful.

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This is not a Blog Post about Bibi

By Amram Altzman March 9, 2015

I am done with Bibi. I’m also done with Purim, which means that I’m even more done with the various editorials analyzing Bibi’s references to the Purim story in Congress. At its root, however, my frustration lies not with Bibi himself, but with the answer that we have given to the question: How should we,…

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The Reform Movement Must Apply its Values to Israel

By Hannah Ehlers July 31, 2014

Early in my Jewish education, I was taught that, as Jews and as human beings living in an imperfect world, we are obligated to stand up and speak out in the face of injustice. However small or large the perceived wrong, and despite our shaking legs and cracking voices or how powerful and vocal the…

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Spreading the (Orthodox) Love

By Jenny Appelbaum May 27, 2014

  Written in response to Eat the Food Without Drinking the Kool-Aid: How to Get the Most out of Orthodox Outreach Programs “Ben Zoma said: Who is wise? He who learns from all people, as it is said: ‘From all those who taught me I gained understanding’ (Psalms 119:99). ‘Who is honored? He who honors…

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A Scavenger Hunt for Jewish Community

By Dani Plung May 8, 2014

This is a busy week at the University of Chicago. For one thing, we students are consumed with the mid-quarter rush of exams and paper due dates. This week in particular, though, we are also exceedingly busy non-academically—if you can imagine anything but academics ever occurring at the University of Chicago. Two major events are…

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The Reform Movement Must Express its Support for a Two-State Solution in Youth Education

By Hannah Silverfine May 2, 2014

A few weeks ago, I had the honor of hearing Rabbi Rick Jacobs, the President of the Union for Reform Judaism (URJ), speak at the J Street U Student Town Hall in Baltimore. As a J Street U leader at Clark University in Worcester, MA, I was very excited to hear him speak passionately about…

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Growing Up an American Jew – 2 Poems

By Sophie Katzman April 18, 2014

2 Poems  by Sophie Katzman:   Descendant’s Blessing Zadie. Zionist. Yellow stars. Young and old yearning for years passed. Yahrzeit. Yiddush: lyb, sholem. War. Woody Allen. Leaving notes on the Western Wall. The V’ahavta. U-blessed by the Orthodox Union. Torah. Tzedakah. Tikkun Olam, we repair the world. Shabbat. Sternberg Sewing. Samuel’s Metal Shop. Schlep. Shylock….

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Questioning the Role of Zionism in Jewish Identity

By Dani Plung March 26, 2014

I don’t remember much about my brief stint on the high school crew team, probably because it only lasted one spring season when I was fourteen. Most of what I do remember is meaningless—and not exceedingly positive—like not being able to carry my share of the boat and thereby forcing a coach to take over…

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Admitting Awkward Things: Or, Coming to Terms with Unsavory History

By Jonathan Katz February 18, 2014

I think my education started early. I remember sitting in the car with my mother at the age of 10, en route from my Hebrew school to … somewhere. It was the spring of 2002, height of the Second Intifada,and the rhetoric that went alongside it. I was narrating all of the things we had…

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Jewish Musical Dreams

By Dani Plung February 12, 2014

Every night, I fall asleep to a playlist titled “Jewish Sleep Music.”  Once upon a time, as a child, it consisted of mainly Kol B’seder’s covers of melodies that I’d learned in Hebrew School, like Shalom Rav and Oseh Shalom. At the time, before I really knew what their lyrics meant, the songs relaxed me because…

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Squeezing the Torah, Flattening Our Selves

By David G. January 31, 2014

When it comes to tedious Torah portions, this week’s,Terumah, has few equals. It trucks on repetitively as Moses describes for us in intricate detail every step necessary for making the Ark of the Covenant, and then the Mishkan, or the Tent of Meeting where the Ark will be held. Every object that will be kept…

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Me and Mein Kampf

By Dani Plung January 22, 2014

    For the past few weeks I’ve seen from various sources on Facebook, and most recently on Tablet, a growing concern about a potentially frightening new trend:  Featured on several Amazon.com best-seller lists are e-book editions of Adolf Hitler’s Mein Kampf. The first responses I’ve seen have been understandably negative, coming from some reasonably…

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Keepin’ it Real with the Israel Family

By David G. November 22, 2013

Anyone who has seen the movie Joseph King of Dreams or experienced the musical Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat will recognize the early scenes of these productions in this week’s Torah portion, Vayeshev. Vayeshev starts with Jacob finally thinking he could take a break, only to have things turn sour for his favored son, Joseph….

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