I attended a dinner in New York this past week to formally launch a new program of the Jewish Agency for Israel (one of our two main overseas partners), Onward Israel.  This new, cutting edge, international project allows college students to travel to Israel for approximately 6 weeks for a professional internship.  It exposes these young adults to Israel while helping to build their resumes.  A Pittsburgh family has helped to both design the project and provided seed funding to get it off the ground.  Pittsburgh, Cleveland, the Metrowest Federation in New Jersey, Moscow and Buenos Aires are among the initial group of participating communities.  The demand for this program in its first year has been tremendous, outstripping the number of spots available.  You, as donors to this Federation, are on the cutting edge of finding ways to engage people in Jewish life and with Israel.

Speaking of engaging with Israel, we now have 285 people participating in the Centennial Mega Mission to Israel this summer.  We have exceeded the “stretch” goal we set as we were planning this trip and are so excited that in just about 6 weeks we will be landing in Tel Aviv.  This is your last chance to join us.  Click here to sign up or for more information. 

On May 15th at 5:30 pm, the Federation’s Centennial Fund for a Jewish Future along with the Agency for Jewish Learning will be hosting Rabbi Elliot Cosgrove as our next speaker in our “Conversations for a Jewish Future Series”.  Rabbi Cosgrove, the Rabbi of the Park Avenue Synagogue in New York, has been named one of the top 50 Rabbis by Newsweek.  I urge you to hear what he has to share on his topic, “What about me?  Personal Meaning and My Future in the Jewish Community”.  For more information and to buy tickets, click here.  

These programs, our agencies and our services overseas happen because of the dollars we as a community secure.  You can help us bring this year’s Annual Campaign to a successful close by helping at one of our remaining phoning sessions next week.   Pick one and give just a few hours to reach our fellow community members to be part of this great Federation.  Sign up here.   If you’ve never done it before, we’ll train you.  With our campaign now at $11.5 Million, our goal of $13 Million is in view.  You can help us get there.  Plus, if you see the graphic below, you can help us have Jimmy Wagner, our Campaign Chair, shave that growth off his face!

Wishing you a Shabbat Shalom.