Summaries+of+2007-2008+Innovation+Project+Grants


 * LEGACY HERITAGE INNOVATION PROJECT** **2007-08 GRANTEE CONGREGATIONS**

__Agudas Achim__**, Attleboro, MA (Reconstructionist, 115 household units)** Agudas Achim will double its current required Shabbat School program from four to eight Shabbatot a year, adding additional learning and gathering opportunities before and after Shabbat worship, and link the project to its “Celebrate Shabbat!” initiative, a Synaplex-like approach to creating multiple gateways to adult Jewish engagement on Shabbat. The approach will be led by Innovator Award co-recipients Kim Bodemer and Annette Lawson.

Baltimore Hebrew Congregation**, Baltimore, MD (Reform, 1350 household units)** BHC will offer an alternative, family-based learning track for fourth grade families, inviting them to design a personalized family Jewish learning plan consisting of several required elements (a Shabbaton, Shabbat services, havdalah, Shabbat dinners and journaling), and choices from a menu of optional learning activities. Groups of eight families will be guided by a congregational mentor, selected for his/her pedagogic experience, Judaic knowledge and “menschlichkeit,” acting as a bridge connecting the mentee families with congregational life. This approach will be expanded each year to culminate in seventh grade.
 * “Etz Chayim Jewish Identity and Experience Project”**

Beit Tefilah Israeli**, Tel Aviv, IS (Non-denominational, 100 household units)** This self-described secular Israeli kehillah will continue building its family-based Shabbat community through family-based study and activities (family Kabbalat Shabbat services, family Shabbat meals, and joint learning for adults and adults around havdalah). Through these learning frameworks involving children, parents, and the two together, the congregation aims to create in a context leading to and shaping the production of an original Israeli Family Siddur siddur. By combining Jewish tradition and contemporary secular Israeli culture in a family learning environent, Beit Tefilah Israeli aims to create a model of family-spiritual-communal experience uniquely tailored to the needs of secular Israelis that will intensify the family learning experience and the Shabbat experience in the congregation and at home.
 * “Family Learning towards the publication of a Family Siddur”**

__Beth Am__**, Los Altos Hills, CA (Reform, 1430 household units)** Beth Am will build upon its history of congregational, lifelong learning and commitment to systemic change through “//Va’ad Lashon Ivrit//,” integrating Hebrew learning across children and adult learning, employing Hebrew as a unifying theme and value in other aspects of congregational life such as worship, committee and board work, and social justice activities.

Beth Am Israel**, Penn Valley, PA (Conservative, 370 household units)** Beth Am Israel intends to extend its existing family-based Shabbat educational program by more thoroughly and systemically utilizing music and musical education to create multiple points of engagement for children, parents and families on Shabbat and holidays, utilizing congregants as teachers and musical guides in the process. The congregation plans to pair veteran members as mentors to families in the education program, and train additional members to serve as musical guides on Shabbat.
 * “Musical Engagement in Judaism”**

__Beth El__**, Baltimore, MD (Conservative, 1700 household units)** Through this pilot project, a group of families will augment their children’s religious school experience with home based family learning and hands-on experiences in the context of familial and communal Shabbat and holiday celebration, Hebrew, tikkun olam projects, field trips and a //Shabbaton//. The project will significantly increase the expectation of parental engagement while providing flexibility and home-based learning in small groups.
 * “Havurah Hadashah”**

Beth El**, Bennington, VT (Reconstructionist, 100 household units)** Beth El will work towards expanding its Shabbat-based intergenerational learning model, which roots children’s family learning in a Shabbat and holiday context in various contexts: home-based Shabbat and holiday observance and meals, Shabbat evening communal meals and learning programs, Shabbat morning family services and children’s learning, tot Shabbat, teen-led services and divrei torah, Shabbat afternoon learning involving teens and older members, and integrating adult, family, and children’s learning around havdalah on a consistent basis.
 * “Green Mountain Shabbat”**

Beth El of South Orange County**, Aliso Viejo, CA (Reform, 657 household units)** Participating families in this alternative track to religious school will be grouped in havurot of six-eight families, engaging in at least one Shabbat and one holiday celebration each month, in addition to two Sunday learning programs. The programming will involve joint and parallel learning for adults and children, and will be augmented by online learning and networking. Participants will include both families with children (religious school and day school families) and without, and will receive mentoring from more senior or experienced congregants. Each havurah will create its own social action project and function as a tzedakah collective.
 * “Bayit to Bayit”**

__Beth El of the Sudbury River Valley__**, Sudbury, MA (Reform, 350 household units)** Beth El will expand its family education approach through “//BaDerech//: Along Our Way,” which will engage congregants at critical “crossroads” or specific lifecycle stages in their Jewish journey (such as parenting young children and mourning), utilizing seasoned congregants as volunteer “guides.” //BaDerech// will involve creating new family learning materials and approaches while strengthening the sense of the congregation itself as a family whose members are responsible to and for each other. By organizing the family learning through a focus on life stages rather than grades, it will create a more systemic approach engaging the entire congregation.

Beth El Temple**, West Hartford, CT (Conservative, 984 household units)** Beth El will develop an intensive track for families, creating a havurah for families with children in grades 3-5 designed to build parental confidence, provide tools for Shabbat observance, and strengthen Shabbat concepts taught in religious school. Havurah members will commit to attending monthly Shabbat family services and dinners, participating monthly in Shabbat dinners, and engaging in experiential learning at other times on Shabbat. Older, more experienced adults and families will serve as mentors to havurah members, and parents in the havurah will be offered other opportunities for learning on an adult level. The experience will culminate with a Shabbaton synthesizing the year’s learning.
 * “Shabbat Babayit Havurah”**

Beth Israel**, Charlottesville, VA (Reform, 400 household units)** The congregation seeks to deepen the engagement of families in Shabbat and holidays by creating havurot of three-five families of comparable needs, interests, backgrounds (religious dynamics, geographic, ages of children, etc.) who will, with the guidance of a Jewish educator, identify their goals for broadening their experience of Shabbat and holiday worship in the home**.** These groups will meet monthly in each other’s homes for Shabbat celebrations and attend Shabbat or holiday services monthly, choosing the service most appropriate to their family needs. In addition, Shabbat Connections will provide written and online Shabbat guides for families, with all the resources needed to deepen these Shabbat experiences in their homes and in the synagogue.
 * “Shabbat Connections”**

Beth Israel**, Omaha, NE (Orthodox, 275 household units)** In a community in which children often are more Jewishly knowledgeable than parents, the congregation will seek ways in which the younger generation can be empowered to serve as an educational resource for adults, specifically in the context of Shabbat and holidays. In addition, it will enhance its multigenerational Shabbat educational programs to help lead families into a pattern of ongoing engagement in the rhythm of Jewish living, and develop a curriculum for parents parallel to the local day school program of study.
 * “Lev Banim al Avotam - Hearts of Children upon their Parents”**

Beth Israel**, Owings Mills, MD (Conservative, 850 household units)** Beth Israel will expand its engagement of families on Shabbat and holidays through study and exploration of the theme of chesed in the context of communal Shabbat practice, and Shabbat afternoon joint parent-child activities, adult study, intergenerational programming, as well as “chagim shel chesed”: a systematic program using each of the festivals and holidays to highlight a different value from the spectrum of chesed and social action in connection with the holiday. Resource material will be developed to highlight chesed/tikkun olam experience for each holiday for each weekly Torah portion. Families will be expected to participate in at least three chesed/tikkun olam activities during the year, related to a holiday or to the Torah portion, using the resource material as their guide.
 * “Project Chesed: Creating a Caring Community”**

Beth Shalom**, Seattle, WA (Conservative, 375 household units)** Beth Shalom will launch “//Machon Mishpachah//,” an alternative model of family education in which parents of children with younger children will commit themselves and their families to a two year process of immersion in Jewish learning and living, being mentored by a separate cohort of volunteer congregants with greater Jewish expertise and experience. The mixture of experiences will include parallel and separate learning, regular Shabbat meals and study, “//tiyulim//” engaging the families in congregational and communal programs, and //gemilut hasadim// opportunities within the congregation and the community.

__Beth Sholom__**, Potomac, MD (Orthodox, 450 household units)** Beth Sholom will create a pilot project engaging up to ten families in a program of immersive Jewish education oriented to making each of them more Jewishly self-sufficient; these families would become mentors to future cohorts. Each family will regularly attend classes offered on Shabbatot and Chagim, attend bi-weekly learning sessions focusing on Jewish holidays and Shabbat and would be geared to the practical experiences of Shabbat in the Home and Shabbat in the Synagogue., and participate in a variety of experiential Jewish learning. Mentor families will guide each family and share a significant number of Shabbatot and chagim.
 * “Ambassadors from Within”**

B’nai Israel**, Millburn, NJ (Conservative, 525 household units)** B’nai Israel seeks to systemically integrate developmentally disabled Jews as full participants in Jewish living, expanding its Shabbat and holiday services and programming designed to be inclusive of developmentally disabled teens and young adults (mostly autistic) and their families, utilizing adult and teen volunteers and mentors, creating an appropriate and user-friendly siddur, integrating adult learning and communal meals into these Shabbatot, and developing an integrated, fully accessible family Shabbat retreat.
 * “****Kehilat B’nai Yisrael”**

B’nai Jeshurun**, New York, NY (Nondenominational, 1800 family units)** B’nai Jeshurun will engage a cohort of families in Reach for Shabbat 2, designed to strengthen the bridge between children’s religious school learning and the experience of Jewish family living on Shabbat, regularly engaging families in Shabbatot in which they attend services, meals and programming together, in the synagogue, on and off-site retreat, and in homes. These Shabbat experiences are led and taught by the congregations' rabbis and educators with increasing leadership by parents and children over the course of the year. The initiative aims to expand the lens of Jewish practice beyond Shabbat through a values-based curriculum, providing the textual foundation to non-ritual, interpersonal and social aspects Jewish living.
 * “Reach for Shabbat II”**

__B’nai Keshet__**__,__ Montclair, NJ (Reconstructionist, 250 household units)** B’nai Keshet will expand its grade-based family education program built around five core values of Jewish spiritual peoplehood by launching “Values in Action,” engaging the entire congregation in learning and practice framed by one of these core values the year, with the congregation addressing a different value each year over the course of a five-year period. This value will create an overarching theme to all congregational activities, inform meetings, adult learning, Shabbat and holiday observance, and create a synergy between the religious school and the rest of the congregation.

__Community Synagogue__**, Rye, NY (Reform, 460 household units)** Community Synagogue has engaged in envisioning a new model for its religious school through The RE-IMAGINE Project, a strategic visioning process through the Experiment in Congregational Education. Its proposal calls for embedding a weekly family learning program in the context of the congregation’s Shabbat morning celebration, engaging parents on a weekly basis in adult learning parallel to their children and integrating both the adult and children’s learning with Shabbat, holidays, and the congregation’s ongoing tikkun olam work.

Emanu-El**, Miami Beach, FL (Conservative, 265 household units)** Emanu-El seeks to foster an inclusive, intergenerational community of Shabbat learning and celebration by training mentors to lead communal Shabbat celebrations, creating resources for such lay leaders, and integrating intergenerational Shabbat celebration and learning throughout the congregation. Intergenerational groups of 12-15 household units, called “Malachei Shabbat” (Shabbat Angels/Messengers) will receive intensive year-long training on different Shabbat services and meals (Friday night, Shabbat morning, and seudah shlishit/havdalah), host Shabbat meals for the community, organize and lead a year-end congregational Shabbat retreat, and explore different ways of integrating Shabbat into their lives, identifying obstacles and discussing ways to overcome them. The program will be expanded by adapting the Malachei Shabbat mentoring curriculum into a workbook and CD for self-led family or adult study. In addition, Shabbat services will be adapted to promote greater intergenerational participation.
 * “Malachei Shabbat”**

Emanuel Synagogue**, West Hartford, CT (Conservative, 660 household units)** Emanuel Synagogue plans to build upon its extensive family education program (//“Torat Chayyim”)// through //Haverim BaTorah//, an initiative to nurture //hevrutot//, learning partnerships between more and less experienced Jewish learners, which will also function as mentoring relationships. The congregation plans to strengthen its sense of community through the //hevruta//-based study of Jewish texts, transforming the congregation into a family of families with relationships built upon and informed by text learning.

__Kavana Cooperative__**, Seattle, WA (Nondenominational, 80 household units)** This small “start up” community is developing an approach to equip families with the resources, knowledge and inspiration to celebrate Shabbat and Jewish holidays in their homes and with the community. Each month, participants will engage in a pair of family programs around a specific holiday; in one, they will learn to prepare for the upcoming holiday, and in the other, they will actually experience celebrating the holiday (or Shabbat) in a family and/or communal setting. The goal is for the families to become self-sufficient in their Jewish practice, empowered to become their children’s primary Jewish educators and models and, out of this experience, create and deepen an intentional Jewish religious community.
 * “Prep and Practice”**

__Kehillat Lev Shalem__**, the Woodstock Jewish Congregation, Woodstock, NY** Through “Creating a Shabbat Community,” Lev Shalem intends to build upon its Family School, expanding dramatically its Shabbat-based component and integrating it with other elements of the congregation’s Shabbat community. Participating families will take part in three Friday night Shabbat gatherings, three full day Shabbatonim, a full weekend retreat, and at least one home-based Friday night communal Shabbat celebration.
 * (Reconstructionist, 345 household units)**

Kol HaLev**, University Heights, OH (Reconstructionist, 170 household units)** Kol HaLev has initiated “//Hagiga//,” an innovative, twice monthly family-based Shabbat morning learning program integrating day school and congregational school children and parents in informal education using a common theme and topic, and involving the entire community on Shabbat afternoon in learning on the same theme. It plans to expand //Hagiga// by having the entire congregation studying the same topic as the families, increasing the number of community-wide learning events on Shabbat afternoon, adding a web-based component to the program, and culminating with a congregational retreat on the theme.

Netivot Shalom**, Berkeley, CA (Conservative, 330 household units)** Netivot Shalom will build upon its successful Shabbat morning program for pre-school families by creating “//Rimmonim//,” a parent-facilitated program of learning and celebration two Shabbat mornings and one Sunday morning each month, organized around the study of 20 //middot//, or Jewish values. Parents will be trained as teachers of these values and the initiative will integrate day school and religious school families in the context of the communal celebration of Shabbat.

North Shore Jewish Center**, Port Jefferson, NY (Conservative, 490 household units)** North Shore Jewish Center will initiative “Project //Chagim Chayyim//,” a Shabbat and holiday-focused family learning initiative that will engage parents and children in parallel learning and link that learning with the congregational celebration of Shabbat and holidays. Growing out of the congregation’s strategic planning and visioning process through the Re-Imagine Project, it will engage all branches of the congregation’s committee structure.

Rodef Shalom**, San Rafael, CA (Reform, 1150 household units)** Rodef Shalom will expand its excellent traditional, grade-based family education programming by creating an alternative model to its congregational school, “//Kol HaMishpacha//,” in which families will elect to participate in neighborhood based //havurot// of ten families committed to regular study, consistent home and communal Shabbat and holiday observance, and creation of a shared tikkun olam project. The pilot project will create three such neighborhood //havurot// of ten families each.

Sha’ar Zahav**, San Francisco, CA (Reform, 316 household units)** Sha’ar Zahav will expand its “Design Team” approach, in which adult congregants (parents and non-parents) study the theme and content of a religious school class’s curriculum, developing a four-week mini-unit which they then teach to the relevant class in collaboration with a classroom teacher. At the end of the mini-unit, the Design Team holds an extended day of learning on Shabbat, including team members and class families. Shaar Zahav will expand the Design Team approach to run three times a year in each lower grade (K/1, 2/3, and 4/5), with one team working in each of three theme units each year. It will also train a core group of congregational education leaders to make the project leadership self-sustaining, develop processes for identifying and recruiting Design Team participants, and create a manual as a tool and support for future congregational education leaders//.//
 * “Expanding Intergenerational Learning: Design Teams & Community Learning Havdalah”**

Sha’arai Shomayim**, Lancaster, PA (Reform, 340 household units)** Having initiated a family-based approach to Shabbat celebration involving parent/adult Shabbat workshops and at-home and congregational Shabbat experiences, the congregation will launch a pilot project involving group of families committed to celebrating Shabbat communally and as a family on a monthly basis, while learning on and participating in the three pilgrimage holidays (Sukkot, Pesach and Shavuot. The pilot will serve as a catalyst to broaden and deepen Shabbat and holiday engagement throughout all facets of the congregation. Because the synagogue is located in an agricultural area, the project promises to model for other rural and exurban synagogues how to thematically link Shabbat and chagim with issues relating to agriculture, hunger, and connection to the land of Israel.
 * “Thematic Approach to Family Learning and Practice”**

Shomrei Emunah**, Montclair, NJ (Conservative, 300 household units)** The congregation will recruit a cohort of day school and public school families with younger (seven or under) children, matching them with mentor families who will host them Shabbat dinners, lunch or havdalah throughout the course of the year. Participants will engage in two Shabbat experiences each month, one synagogue-based experience (involving adult learning and a children’s activity, a joint family activity, and a meal) and another in their own or their mentor family’s home. Participants will join in a monthly intergenerational, family-based service, and create a family journal throughout the year, recording each family member’s responses to their Shabbat experiences.
 * “Sacred Time/Sacred Space: Shabbat Matters”**

Sinai Synagogue**, South Bend, IN (Conservative, 170 household units)** A congregation which has already developed a successful family-based Shabbat educational program, Sinai seeks to increase the intensity and meaningfulness of its families’ Shabbat experience and improve the quality of its education program through enhancing the musical aspect of its approach (through Shabbat z’mirot and non-instrumental music during other times on Shabbat); developing more creative modes of teaching Torah; recruiting and training teachers, most of whom are drawn from within the community; and building build upon its success on Shabbat morning by developing similar programming for Shabbat afternoon and motzei Shabbat.
 * “Family Education at Sinai Today (FEAST)”**

Suburban Temple-Kol Ami**, University Heights, OH (Reform, 450 household units)** Through “L’Chayim! Learning for Life,” Suburban Temple-Kol Ami will train congregants who have engaged in serious adult Jewish learning over the previous three years to serve as mentors for families, helping them develop personalized learning plans, guiding them in home and communal Jewish practice, and sharing periodic communal celebrations of learning. The initiative is an outgrowth of several years of congregation-wide visioning and planning.

Tiferet Israel**, Malden, MA (Reform, 175 households)** Through its Partnered Education Program (P.E.P.), the congregation plans to build upon its grade-level family education program by moving towards a model which engages parents as full partners in the educational process, reorganizes the synagogue governance to reflect better an integrated, multigenerational program of formal and informal learning, with the aim of a unified approach to worship, learning, social action and community building. The PEP approach will also focus on home-based learning and living through training and the use of congregant mentors.

West End Synagogue**, New York, NY (Reconstructionist, 307 household units)** The congregation will expand some current pilot projects, developing a monthly Shabbat morning program for pre-B’nai Mitzvah children and their parents, adding a monthly Shabbat morning family service/program targeted to families with younger children, and developing four family-based learning and tikkun olam programs centered on holidays. These will be expanded to include additional opportunities for socializing, prayer, social action, and study emphasizing the value of Jewish traditions to daily life. While focusing on families with school-age children, the programs will be designed to attract diverse groups within the congregation.
 * “Bonim B’Yachad:** **Building Jewish Life Together”**