USCJ: Building Membership Bridges

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Outstanding Practices: Building Membership Bridges

The Case of Northern Hills Synagogue – Congregation B’nai Avraham

Many Conservative synagogues are confronted with the difficult task of building bridges between the families who choose to send their children to days school programs, and those who choose the supplementary school system offered within their congregations or cities. The schism existing between these two groups of membership populations often begins as a simple philosophical difference of opinion regarding Jewish education. That difference of opinion often turns into the creation of separate social groups within the two camps, differing religious practices at home, and varied practices relating to synagogue attendance. At Northern Hills Synagogue (NHS), approximately 80% of the congregation’s children in grades K-8 attend a Jewish Day School. The remaining 20% are children who attend the synagogue’s small supplementary school. This ratio is unlike most other Conservative congregations, in that NHS has a higher percentage of children attending day school than supplementary and differences between the two exist. It is a concern that the lay leadership of the synagogue chose to focus its attention on over the past number of years. The leadership has been aware of this problem since the early 1990’s. The process for change began in 1999.

Traditionally, the NHS congregational families who sent their children to day school were also the same people who attended Shabbat and holiday religious services more often than families who utilized the religious school. However, the religious school families were required to bring their children to school three days each week for the six hour program, which takes place on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Sundays. It is easy to understand why they often chose not to attend Shabbat services on Friday night or Saturday after already haven driven to classes three days a week. However, the synagogue professionals and board determined that this was an institutional problem for many reasons including having:

It was also determined that the synagogue needed to spend some time working on this difficult situation. As a result, many congregational lay leaders became involved in a process of evaluation to determine what steps might be taken to heal old wounds, while bringing together the religious school families and day school families of the congregation. This was a difficult decision because the board members knew that it would take many human resources and financial resources to develop an appropriate evaluation process that would result in suggested solutions to the problem. At this time, the synagogue was involved, (and still is) in a relocation process and building a new building, which also took a great number of congregational resources. The board’s decision to make the effort to evaluate the day school/religious school problem and work on solving it is even more commendable because of the timing!/p>

Evaluation Tools

The process of evaluating this specific problem began with a more general process of hiring a Director of Education and Programming. After many town meetings and committee discussions, the synagogue decided to invest in a professional that was qualified to do more than administer the school. The town meetings were held at congregants’ homes in various areas of the community, and the general consensus was that someone should be hired who would be responsible for the youth groups, Shabbat and holiday programming, adult education, family education, and the religious school. Hiring this type of person would mean conducting a national search and being prepared to spend more than the synagogue had in the past on professional salaries. The availability of funds from the Jewish Federation of Cincinnati through it’s SEED (Synagogue Educational Excellence Directive) program was a great help to the congregation in this respect.

Someone was hired to take the position as Director of Education and Programming in the fall of 2000. One of the first tasks presented to this professional (Rebecca Starr) was to work towards building bridges between the day school families and religious school families. At this point, the synagogue was in a very good place to move to the next steps of evaluation and brainstorming. A professional educator had been hired with a social work background in community organization, the rabbi (Rabbi Barnard) was involved and interested in helping to work on this issue, and lay people were available to work with the professional staff.

NHS began an educational visioning process in May of 2001, which focussed on all aspects of formal and informal education within the synagogue community. First, a visioning committee was formed, which was made up of approximately 25 congregants. The make-up of the committee was important because it was diverse and varied. Not only were education committee chairs (adult, family, religious school) included, but adults of various age, background, and educational interest were included, as well as religious school and day school parents. The visioning committee met several times during the year and was able to create an educational vision for the congregation as well as visions for each of the areas of education including; adult education, religious school, and informal education. The family education component of this committee was neglected, but NHS would visit issues surrounding family education again through the USCJ Framework process and a congregational retreat. The visioning process was well structured, and it used the ECE (Experiment in Congregational Education) publication called, Becoming a Congregation of Learners, by Isa Aaron. Each session began with a text study surrounding issues of education in Judaism and followed by structured activities, which encouraged participants to think creatively and critically about all areas of education within the congregation. There was much discussion about the need to build bridges between religious school and day school families, and more importantly, each of these two groups began to see the perspective of the other and to appreciate and understand the decisions they were making in regards to their children’s Jewish education. With raised awareness and a written vision and mission for education at NHS, the congregation was beginning to make progress.

The synagogue held a congregational retreat in May of 2002 to discuss the educational vision established by the visioning committee and to discuss the Northern Hills Synagogue of the future and what the congregation might like to see in its new synagogue, which was relocating. The setting was a small and cozy lodge in a park area near the city and approximately 50 of our congregational families attended. The day was structured so that adults and children would participate inactivities geared at creating a congregational vision of education. Children were asked to design the new building and its school and youth wings, as they would like to see them. Adults were asked to develop their ideal NHS learning community. The day-long retreat was successful in that it helped to define congregational and educational vision among more people, but it was also a success because it allowed different groups of people who would not normally spend time together, to socialize, pray, and learn together in a neutral setting. Debates were deep, but heartfelt, and most participants left with warm feelings of their congregation and the work that had been done.

United Synagogue’s Framework for Educational Excellence came to our congregation at an ideal time. We had done a great deal of educational visioning work with our congregation and had received input from the majority of our congregants in various ways including dialogue, evaluation, and brainstorming. The Framework gave NHS guidelines, which would allow the professional staff and the committee, which was specially chosen to implement many of the suggestions that had been discussed by members of the congregation. The Framework committee was ma de up of educators within the congregation and they were very involved in the process of evaluating the religious school program as well as all of the materials we had gathered from the visioning process. The committee happily discovered that the framework guidelines would allow us to change our strict and traditional six-hour a week model to a more family oriented and Shabbat observant model. The committee felt that it was important to maintain many of our strict requirements for religious school students while incorporating new framework ideas including; required Shabbat attendance, more family education programs, and retreat programs. The committee saw Model IV of the framework as an excellent opportunity to improve the religious school and to bring the congregation together at the same time.

A Comprehensive Solution

After reviewing the results of each of the evaluative tools and processes above, the committees, and board of NHS, along with the Rabbi and Director of Education and Programming, the synagogue was prepared to implement new program ideas and alter traditional programs. The Framework’s guidelines for Model IV allow the congregation to be very creative in the way it decides to fulfill its requirements. Each of the new programs was phased into the congregation and they worked together to satisfy the expressed educational desires of the congregation, the requirements of Model IV of the USCJ Framework, and the congregation’s goal of building bridges between religious school and day school families. Four of the programs are outlined below:

The youth commission created a junior youth group for our 3rd-5th graders, which meets once every two months for purely social programs. The youth commission felt that it was important to allow the children in this age group to get to know each other and become close with each other. They felt that this could be accomplished while they are younger so that their transition to Kadima and USY would be more comfortable and so that they could spend time together despite their different Jewish educational affiliations. Recent events of the Chaverim group as it is called, included bowling for Chai, a professional hockey game, laser tag, bowling, and a movie night. Even though some 3rd-5th graders attend the NHS religious school and others attend a day school, the Chaverim youth group allows them to come together with their NHS peers.

We found that Kadima and USY are also very good modes for bringing religious school students and day school students together. The youth groups are a place where religious observance, culture, social action, and fun are prevalent and they attract nearly all of the congregation's teens and pre-teens. The youth commission and the synagogue support youth group activities in order to continue to strengthen the relationships between religious school and day school students throughout high school.

We also partner with other area Conservative congregations to plan joint USY and Kadima programs a few times a year. This makes the youth group members happy because they can spend time meeting other Jewish teens, but it also helps build bridges between various constituent groups. This is often a difficult issue for some cities and congregations, but the rewards for such partnerships for the youth groups members themselves far outweigh the political concerns and loss of membership concerns of the leadership of the synagogues.

Model IV of the USCJ Framework for Excellence requires that we hold family education activities and programs for our students, but the synagogue saw this requirement as an excellent means of bringing religious school and day school families together. We built five Friday night dinners and Shabbat morning programs into our calendar, which our religious school students are required to attend. On the weeks that these events occur, class is not held on Sunday morning to allow some flexibility for our families, while maintaining the six-hour a week attendance requirement of NHS. These Shabbat events were also appealing to our day school families and created another arena for communication and relationships between the two groups. The Friday night dinners and Shabbat morning programs are not only special occasions because the congregation celebrates Shabbat together, but they are also structured around a family education program with Shabbat appropriate activities. We use our religious schoolteachers and staff to help implement the programs. This programming time slot serves as a wonderful opportunity for intergenerational programming, adult education, prayer, and celebration. At our most recent Shabbat dinner, we had 109 people in attendance. This is a large number considering our congregation has only 175 family units. Recent programming themes for Shabbat dinners and Shabbat morning have included a Tu’Bishvat Seder, Passover around the world, Shalom Bayit, and Passport to Israel. Details for each of these programs can be provided upon request.

The Shabbat morning minyan is very important in building relationships between religious school and day school families. The Shabbat morning liturgy is not necessarily a subject of study in day schools and allows for all of our young congregants to learn something new together using the customs of the congregation. We offer Tot Shabbat for 4 year- olds up to 2nd grade and we hold Junior Congregation for 3rd-5th graders. In addition, one of the local Hebrew Union College Professors who is also a member of NHS, works with our 6th graders and teaches them Torah trope once or twice a month during Shabbat morning services. Saturday morning is a place for different groups from the synagogue membership to come together and our synagogue’s children spend the time engaged in activities which include drama, story telling, study of Shir HaKavod and the Torah service, Torah trope, and other basic Saturday morning t’filot. A strong Saturday morning program in which the kids are excited about attending leads to the formation of positive relationship between children as well as their parents.

In the past, NHS had difficulty recognizing the children of the congregation in a way that included both day school and religious school students. Now, in the continuing effort to bring the two groups together, we hold grade level Shabbatot. We recognize all of the 1st graders of the congregation together at the same time on specified Shabbat mornings and do this for each of the grade levels. For kindergarten students specifically, grade level Shabbat recognition replaced the conventional religious school consecration. The synagogue introduces them to the congregation and assigns them parts of the service for participation. We also hold a graduation Shabbat. This Shabbat honors all of our high school, religious school, and day school graduates. This shift in procedure has resulted in a shift in thinking for the congregation. We now think of the children of the congregation according to their cohort as opposed to their educational affiliations. The Director of Education and Programming views all of the children of the synagogue as her responsibility and does not only focus on the religious school students.

Conclusions

The following points made a big difference in the levels of success gained at NHS as we worked and continue to work towards building relationships between our day school and religious school families:

Outstanding Practices: Building Membership Bridges

The Case of Northern Hills Synagogue – Congregation B’nai Avraham

Evaluation Tools

A Comprehensive Solution

Conclusions

Contact Information