More than 115 Jewish educators from many walks of life – from museums and synagogues to Jewish day schools and organic farms – gathered recently at the Catalyst Ranch in the West Loop to dream up new and creative ways of inspiring today’s young people.
“It was a fresh, energizing charge,” said Lori Stark, director of the Ramah Day Camp who found the stimulating conversations at the “iChallenge” event on Jan. 19 essential for Jewish educators. “To get all those people with different experiences and backgrounds into one room was an exciting endeavor. I’ve not had that opportunity to brainstorm with such a variety of people like that before.”
Sponsored by The iCenter, the “iChallenge” event was an ideas incubator for Chicagoland educators who work with children ages pre-K to grade 8. Discussions were led by Dr. David Bryfman of the Jewish Education Project in New York City and Adam Shames of the Chicago-based Kreativity Network, who used exercises to draw out creative energies so participants could listen and build on ideas together.
What transpired was a free-flow of discussion among parents, Jewish community leaders, Hebrew teachers, Northwestern University students, Jewish overnight camp heads, and even the head of a youth museum program, “Mummies and Masterpieces.” Designed to support ground-breaking projects and experiments in Jewish education, the architects of these ideas will receive professional enrichment and up to $30,000 in financial support for their project.
“It’s something Jewish education needs to do to keep up with the times and with this generation,” Stark said. “You want to be at the top of the iPod playlist – so to speak – and the event really pushed us to rethink how to reach this generation…. You walked out of there with your wheels turning. They gave you inspiration and encouragement.”
In small groups, participants grappled with issues such as:
- Engaging Jewish youth so that they feel they are full members of the community.
- Tapping into Jewish youth’s creativity and energy to ensure a vibrant Jewish future.
- Increasing participation so students become lifelong active Jews.
- Empowering kids with Jewish knowledge in order to understand they are part of something bigger.
- Inspiring kids to be passionate about being Jewish and being part of the Jewish community.
- Making Jewish involvement including education more affordable.
- Attracting the best professionals to Jewish education.
- Opening the door to real Hebrew fluency.
- Igniting the Jewish soul to action.
“The iChallenge was an experiment in the power of bringing together diverse voices, ideas and experiences,” explained Anne Lanski, the iCenter’s Executive Director. The Chicago, Ill.-based national nonprofit is working to create and promote meaningful and inspiring models for Jewish education that center around Israel as a country with a rich cultural history and homeland for the Jewish people.
“At one point, Adam Shames had people stand if they knew more than 50 people in the room and only two people stood up. We hope this event sparks a new era of creative vision and collaboration among talented individuals, educators and institutions,” Lanski said.
“I left the amazing event inspired to come up with something that's out of the box and truly a departure from the old standards,” said Deborah Harris, Technology Coordinator of the Sager Solomon Schechter Middle School in Northbrook, Ill.
”After speaking to other educators, I realized that I wanted to develop something that gets kids out of the building and into the community,” Harris said. “As a technology person, I want to use the technology as a tool, but it's not the focus. For instance, my students learn wonderful skills in school: digital photo editing, movie making and audio recording. How can we use that to help them tell their stories and the stories of others? I also came away with a strong commitment to authentic student engagement. Whatever project I pursue has to turn the kids on.”
Andrea Hoffman, associate vice president of the Charles and Lynn Schusterman International Center Hillel: the Foundation for Jewish Campus Life, also found the event a great opportunity to network in ways that just don’t happen that often. “It was really a pleasure to think about projects in a way that could contribute to the success of others and not only be focused on how the day could benefit my own work,” she said.
Natalie Blitt, the iCenter’s Ideas Incubator Director, was inspired by the excitement that overtook the room. “Here you have this group of fantastic educators, innovative thinkers and invested parents and they left their institutional identity at the door and came together. The level of collaboration was really phenomenal. We look forward to seeing the implementation of the fabulous ideas that come out of the conversations held at the Catalyst Ranch.”
