Charlie Render, Author at Jewish Federation of Greater Atlanta

Being an Israeli Shelach

I was born in Israel and have been living in Israel my whole life. As an Israeli teen, I am required to take part in a volunteering activity at school, and there are different kinds of volunteering activities to choose from. I chose to be a young “Shelach” guide. “Shelach” stands for “Field Nationality Society”. Being a young “Shelach” guide means to learn about Israel – its history, places, and society through touring the country.

Throughout the “Shelach” activities I experienced camp life, including: Building tents, cooking in the field and lighting a fire. We also get a taste of life in the army as we practice discipline, basic training, and work as a member of a team to accomplish tasks. We are also being trained on different subjects, and as we grow older, we may become trainers ourselves.

We are also very much involved in community life, where we support and assist our community whenever needed.

I am proud to be a young “Shelach” guide being able to contribute to my country. Whenever I achieve a goal or finish a mission, I feel proud of myself and my team. I enjoy the activities and the tours we have very much, and I feel satisfied that I can train younger teens, strengthen their connection to Israel and teach them to love the country and the Israeli life.

Charlie Render In JumpSpark

My Typical School Day As An American Teen

It’s Monday morning. My alarm goes off at 6:15 am, which is too early. Way too early. But for me, this is just the start of a normal day. I like to run in the mornings, so I have to get up this early to make sure I have enough time to be in the car on the way to school by 8:10. I roll out of bed and get ready to go, passing the mezuzah on my bedroom door frame, then my front door, taking off down the street as the run begins to peek through the clouds. I love running in the morning. It’s a stress reliever, a break, a time all to myself. Sometimes I listen to podcasts, or music, or nothing at all. I pass the same people each morning, the walking mom in the bright colored tank top, the men who run together, the man waiting for the Marta bus on the corner. My morning runs are one of the only constants in my life, and they bring me a great sense of peace.

When I get back to my house after about an hour, it’s time to get ready for the day. I grab some breakfast, which normally consists of oatmeal with a banana, and of course a cup of coffee. I call out to my brother, who is perpetually late, that I am leaving whether he is ready or not. He normally makes it to the car door before I’m out of the driveway. Then we are off to school. It’s about a 10 minute drive to my high school.I go to an inner city school so it’s a pretty diverse place, but there aren’t that many Jews, maybe me and about 5 or 6 other people in my grade. This means I often have to deal with tests on high holidays and pointed stares whenever we study the Holocaust. Even so, my school remains one of the most accepting environments I’ve ever found myself in. I feel lucky when I say I’ve never felt like an outsider or unwelcome in any way because of my Judaism.

I am a junior and my brother Meyer is a freshman. We don’t see each other much during the day, but then again, I don’t see many people during my school day. Because of the pandemic, classes were all online for the majority of this school year. When school reopened in February, only about 15% of students chose to come back. Out of my four classes, the biggest one has four people aside from me. Everyone else is at home.

At the beginning of every class I log on to Zoom. Even though I am back in school, due to the fact that the majority of students are not, we still conduct classes all online. We have an hour-long break for lunch, which is nice. I spend that in my photography class. I’m the only one in that class who went back to school in person. There used to be one other boy there with me, but he was a senior and he graduated so now it is just me and my teacher. I’m fine with that though, I like my teacher and I enjoy the time I get to spend talking with her. My youngest brother’s bar mitzvah was during the first week of May, so I’ve been telling her all about that. I read Torah and I didn’t mess up! My family was super lucky because we actually were allowed to invite guests to the service (we had 50 people).

At the end of the school day, which is at 3:30, I walk out to the parking lot and wait for Meyer to meet me in my car. Sometimes I have to bring some of his friends home too, a lot of them live in our neighborhood. I like to drive with the windows down, especially since it’s gotten warmer out. There is this really pretty street that we drive down on the way home, it’s lined with cute houses and there is a park too, but my favorite part is all the trees that flower in the spring.

Once we get home, I start on my homework, or mock trial, or my school newspaper article, or anything else that needs to get done. Friday nights are different though. On Friday nights (on the rare chance that all five of my family members are home for dinner) we gather around the table over my mom’s homemade challah. We do the brachah over the candles, the wine, the children, and of course the delicious bread. Then we sit down to a home cooked meal made by my mom and myself, and we enjoy our time together.

Charlie Render In JumpSpark

EMBRACING OUR UNIQUE MENTAL HEALTH STORIES WITH PAMELA SCHULLER

Alexa Freedman and Julia Harris, Strong Women Fellows, co-authored this article originally published in VOXATL.

As anyone who struggles with mental illness knows, it is hard to love your brain and appreciate your mind, when you know that in some cases it is the root of your issues. However, Pamela Schuller, an internationally known disability and mental health advocate and professional standup comedian, has learned to love her brain and embrace what makes her different.

In March, JumpSpark’s Strong Women Fellowship got to hear from Schuller. She has an incredibly interesting story and used hilarious anecdotes to tell it. When she was young, Pamela had the worst diagnosed case of Tourette Syndrome in the country. Pamela says she loves Tourettes; it’s the best neurological disorder she could have asked for, she told us.

How, you may ask, did she make it to this point? It was a long journey of self-discovery, personal growth, and unfortunately, pain. For a long time, Pamela said, she believed she was a waste of space; she struggled with being an outsider and with her disability defining her. When asked to write something she loved about herself, she was unable. Throughout the years, however, with help from therapists, friends, and community, Pamela has learned that she is more than her diagnosis and has so much to give to the world.

Throughout our session, Pamela shared many funny stories from her childhood experiences, but each one taught a lesson. She certainly faced many hardships growing up, including having a broken neck and several broken bones due to her tics, but she chose not to focus on those when telling her story. For example, she shared how one night, she was barking (this happens when she is excited), and a neighbor complained about her having a dog in their no-pet complex. Pamela said she absolutely mortified the landlord, who had come to explain the rule, when she said the barking was her. The landlord promised to never come to her if anyone else complained again, and according to Pamela, she went out and got a dog right after. This funny story really stuck with me, since instead of being upset Pamela really made the most out of the situation.

She was once told that her case of Tourette’s Syndrome was one of the worst, but today she uses her own story in hopes of inspiring others. Pamela taught a very important lesson to the Strong Women Fellowship: Every person has struggles, but every person still adds so much value to the world. If allowed, a perceived disability or illness can add wonderful things to a person’s life. It is possible to balance struggling and loving oneself at the same time.

Alexa’s takeaway: As someone who has struggled with mental illness her whole life, it was so empowering for me to hear Pamela talk about all the ways she has embraced her diagnoses and let them enrich her life, instead of taking away from it. It gave me a lot of hope to see Pamela thriving and having so much self-love because of the way she has transformed her diagnoses into blessings instead of burdens. Pamela’s journey is proof that with help and hard work, it is possible to break down defining barriers and rewrite who you are and how you want to live.

Julia’s takeaway: Pamela taught us so many valuable lessons and made me feel nothing but proud of who I am and what makes me different. I learned the importance of celebrating our differences, and her unique outlook really spoke to me. I also recognized how impactful it is to advocate for others who cannot do so for themselves, or else the pointing and laughing will continue. Sometimes I refrain from doing things that will make me stand out in fear of being judged, but I now realize that standing out is really special, and that there is no point in only considering others and not myself. It was so reassuring to know how much greatness came out of Pamela’s tough situation, and this made me think with a much more positive outlook. I now know that what might seem like an unbearable situation for me has to have some upsides; it just may take a little digging. Pamela Schuller — a Jewish, 4-foot 6-inch woman with Tourette’s (or, as she calls it, “the trifecta”), taught me so much from the little time spent with her. I will certainly be passing on her story and using her advice in my daily life.

Alexa Freedman is an 11th grader at The Galloway School, and Julia Harris is a 10th grader at Dunwoody High School. Both are second-year Fellows and Peer Leaders for the JumpSpark Strong Women Fellowship.

Charlie Render In JumpSpark

An Atlanta foundation bets big on the Israel gap year

30 Jewish teens will receive gap-year subsidies of at least $10,000 next year

As the number of American students in Israel on gap-year programs between high school and college began to jump during the pandemic, an Atlanta foundation was taking careful note.

Now, the Zalik Family Foundation and the Jewish Federation of Greater Atlanta are trying to sustain that “COVID bump” by making the gap-year experience more affordable.

“It’s basically a fifth year of college,” said Kelly Cohen, until recently the director of JumpSpark, the Atlanta federation’s center for teen programming.

Religiously observant communities in North America have long made a practice of sending high school graduates to spend a year studying at a yeshiva or seminary, but the practice was less common outside them, said Sheryl Korelitz, director of gap-year recruitment at Masa Israel Journey, which supports providers of long-term Israel trips for people ages 18-30 and is funded by the government of Israel and the Jewish Agency. In the 2019-2020 academic year, about 3,000 North American teens studied in religious settings, while 634 participated in other kinds of programs, such as the Young Judaea Year Course, which offers classroom study and volunteer experience, or the Nativ Leadership Program, offered by the Conservative movement.

Familiarity with the concept extended beyond the relatively small group of families that participated, however, said Korelitz, who was working at the time as a guidance counselor for Farber Hebrew Day School-Yeshivat Akiva in Southfield, Mich. When incoming freshmen realized last spring that they would be starting their college careers on Zoom, the idea of spending the year in Israel instead started to gain broader appeal.

“People started scrambling,” she said, and the number of students from North America participating in the 30 non-religious gap-year programs Masa offers jumped by about 40%, to 1,100.

The pandemic limited the experience in some ways, Korelitz said. Groups of students had to quarantine upon entering Israel, and couldn’t travel freely throughout the country. Sites of cultural and historic interest were closed. However, many of the students became involved in anti-COVID volunteer work, such as putting together vaccination packets, which they found meaningful, she added.

The Jewish Community Response and Impact Fund (JCRIF), formed in the early days of the pandemic, responded to the opportunity to help those families and nurture their relationship to Israel by creating the JCRIF Gap Year in Israel Stimulus Fund, which gave funding to gap-year programs and scholarships to participants.

Inspired by JCRIF, the Zalik family came to JumpSpark with the idea of creating a local Atlanta program that would be easy to replicate in other communities, Cohen said.

Helen and David Zalik, the foundation’s principals, similarly said they wanted to harness the impact of the pandemic to create more enthusiasm for the gap-year experience, which they had long believed makes a lasting impact on students’ lives, enhances their readiness for college and will also improve Israel’s image on campus.

“If successful in Atlanta, we hope to help expand this model to other communities,” they said in an email.

In 2019, 12 students from the area participated in gap-year programs; during the pandemic, that number rose to 19, Cohen said.

To grow it further, JumpSpark did research through an internet survey and follow-up phone calls to families who tended to send their children straight to college, and asked them what they thought about the possibility of a year in Israel after high school.

“It wasn’t on their radar,” Cohen said. “There’s this hyper-focus on college admissions. Everything is about building your brand and your resume and going to school right away. But we knew we could disrupt that.”

JumpSpark also asked how much financial support was necessary to make the experience a fiscal possibility, and found that $10,000 was the right-sized subsidy. A gap year costs between $14,000 and $25,000, said Korelitz. Many federations give scholarships or subsidies for gap years, but the Zalik Family Foundation’s is the biggest, she added.

The foundation agreed to fund 30 subsidies; if a student agrees to add a service component, the subsidy rises to $15,000.

JumpSpark will apply to the Zalik Family Foundation to renew the grant, and now the question is whether the program will be taken up by funders in other cities, Cohen said.

“Because of the size of Atlanta we’re very much right-sized to do a pilot,” she said. “This work is replicable, but you have to have funding behind it.”

This article was originally published in eJewishPhilanthopy.

Charlie Render In JumpSpark

JumpSpark Amplifying Israel Pop Culture Phrases

When compiling the list, we enjoyed learning more about each other’s cultures and we hope you enjoy reading our list of pop culture phrases too!

This list has been compiled by our April Amplifying Israel Teen Fellows: Rian Gordon, Atlanta and Noa Boguslavsky and Tamir Shaginyan, Yokneam, Israel.

Hebrew Phrases:

“Al hapanim” – על הפנים- when something is really bad and not fun.

Example- I’m really bored… this concert is “al hapanim.”

“Sababa” – סבבה – okay or “cool”

Example- “sababa”, I’ll be there tonight.

“Chai beseret” – חי בסרט – something you call someone when he is “dreaming” or not connect to reality (in free translation it is- living in a movie).

“Met al ze”- מת על זה- when you wanna say you really love something (in free translation- “im dying on it”). Example- this food is great! “Ani met al ze”!

“Para para” – פרה פרה – very similar to- “one step at a time” (a bit weird, but in free translation it means- “cow cow”).

Nadir-נדיר “awesome”

Sahi -סאחי “someone boring and simple”

Ani Pipi-אני פיפי “It’s so funny, I can pee out of laughter.״

English Phrases:

“That slaps” – when something is excellent or amazing!

Example: That song slaps!

“Break a leg”- A way to wish someone good luck before a performance of some kind.

“She’s so sweet, she told me to break a leg on stage tonight.”

“I’m down”- I agree or am interested.

“Wanna go to the movies?” “Ya I’m down.”

YOLO- “You only live once”

“I know I shouldnt eat the whole pizza by myself but YOLO.”

“For real” – to speak honestly

“That was scary for real.”

Drip- extreme coolness, style

“You got some nice drip.”

Charlie Render In JumpSpark

‘Jewish geography’ contest on Zoom draws thousands

‘Who Knows One?’ sees its post-pandemic life in fundraising — and maybe matchmaking

The pandemic’s restrictions on social life have inspired new ways of connecting, from virtual birthday parties to Zoom speed-dating to digital simchas. In the Jewish community, they’ve given rise to a gamified version of “Jewish geography,” a favorite pastime of youth group alums, campers and others who have been active in Jewish social circles. Created by Micah Hart, “Who Knows One?” is named for the Passover Seder song of the same name, and was inspired by an ESPN show Hart watched in which the hosts competed to see who could get the most famous person to join a Zoom call. “It just sort of dawned on me. We were all at home, we had nothing else to do,” he told eJewishPhilanthropy.

A resident of Atlanta, Hart is the son of Macy Hart, a longtime director of the Henry S. Jacobs Camp, a Union for Reform Judaism camp in Utica, Miss., and the founder of the Goldring/Woldenberg Institute for Southern Jewish Life. He had lost his job as head of social media for the restaurant franchise Buffalo Wild Wings early in the pandemic, and as a lifelong fan of Jewish geography, in which at least two people identify who they know in common, he realized that it could be enjoyable as a filmed contest. He also felt he had the skills to try to make it happen due to his professional background as a creator of digital content. Now, “Who Knows One?” is Hart’s full time job.

The show, which runs on Wednesday and Saturday nights on Facebook Live, premiered last April 25; it has taken several forms in 150 showings since then, including a March Madness-type tournament called “Elijah’s Cup” that ran through Passover, but the basic premise remains the same: The hosts announce the name of a Jewish person unknown to the competitors, and the contestants or (or in some cases, teams of contestants) work to locate that person and bring him or her onto the Zoom call by building a chain of connections using only clues from the hosts — no help from the internet allowed. When the game ends quickly, Hart and his co-hosts bring in a second individual. “There’s a lot of improv in the show,” Hart said. “We know where we’re starting and ending but nothing about the middle, and the more off the rails it goes, the more entertaining it is.” Hart can’t estimate the total number of people who have been exposed to the show because audience numbers vary widely, but a regular Wednesday or Saturday night show can attract up to 4,000 viewers, split about equally between those who watch live and those who tune in later.

The regular shows occasionally generate revenue in the form of sponsorships, but the bulk of the business is what Hart calls “community games.” Those can take the form of a “fun-raiser,” in which a group pays him to host a show as a fun way for them to spend time together online, or a “fundraiser.” Organizations from the World Union for of Progressive Judaism to a slew of summer camps to the Melton School of Adult Jewish Learning have all raised money on “Who Knows One?” and Hart, for his part, charges a flat fee, although upgrade packages are also available. One Jewish group — JumpSpark, a source of Jewish programming for teens in Atlanta — used the show as both a fundraiser and an educational experience. Four teens competed on a JumpSpark-sponsored show, which raised more than $3,000, said a spokeswoman. The students each chose an individual cause to support, and friends and family contributed to a pool of funds. All four causes — Project Merry Mitzvah, Camp Jenny, the Anti-Defamation League and Repair the World — received donations from that pool, although Repair the World received the most, as its sponsor won the game. “I appreciated the platform it provided me to reconnect with other teens and family friends I hadn’t spoken to in a while,” said Abby Limor of Temple Beth Tikvah, one of the participants.

As Hart has gained experience in hosting the fundraisers, he’s devised additional ways to raise money; the audience can “buy” extra clues for the contestant they support, for example. He has a brain trust with whom he bounces ideas around, and audience suggestions have also helped shape the show — the name of the show was a viewer’s idea, he said. But he’s also worked for the Atlanta Hawks and the NBA, and his professional background helps, too, as he turns the project into more of a business. “Most of my life was about figuring out how to make money from digital content in a way that’s not intrusive for an audience,” he said.

Hart aims for an unpretentious vibe he calls “soul-nourishing” — the whole enterprise leans heavily into the come-as-you-are aesthetic of pandemic-era Zoom. Recommended attire is loungewear, although some contestants sport “Who Knows One?”-branded swag in the form of red headbands. The show also tries to be inclusive and to avoid assuming that every American Jew is Ashkenazi and fair-skinned, Hart said. He replaced a tie-breaker round that depended on finding someone with a “typically” Jewish name, for example, with one that focuses on occupations and home addresses.

As people get vaccinated and are able to safely gather again in person, demand for “Who Knows One?” could drop, Hart said. In that case, he will consider cutting the Saturday night show. However, he believes that the communal need for connection satisfied by the show predated coronavirus, although the pandemic exacerbated it. “We’re all isolated from each other, and that’s true in the pandemic era, but it already existed,” he said. “We accumulate people throughout our lives that we care about — from camp, school, college, previous jobs — as we get older, the ability to spend time with those people just melts.”

He’s considering several possible mechanisms to grow the show, including more community games. He’s toying with the idea of taking the show live, in the style of NPR’s “Wait, Wait, Don’t Tell Me,” and has developed some customers outside the Jewish community, such as the American College of Emergency Physicians. “Desi Chain,” which plays on a Hindi term for people of Indian origin or descent, is a “sister show” to “Who Knows One?” Another possibility: a dating show, which Hart says someone asks him to do at least once a week. “I know the interest is there,” he said. “I have not figured out how to do that. People are still pretty isolated. But I think it’s possible, coming out of the pandemic, that some sparks could potentially fly.”

This article was originally published in eJewishPhilanthropy.

Charlie Render In JumpSpark

A Little Taste Of Life: How Tradition Kitchens Changed Atlanta For The Better

Rachel Binderman and Rebecca Kann, Strong Women Fellows, co-authored this article originally published in VOXATL.

Food brings people together — families, friends, and strangers alike. Food brings together communities from all backgrounds and has the ability to bond people over a home-cooked dish. Some of our fondest memories are around meals, and food engages some of our strongest senses: smell, and taste.

For Rachel, food has always been a huge part of her family and Jewish identity. For as long as she can remember, her family sat around our dinner table every Friday night, sang the prayers, lit the candles, and ate Mom’s delicious challah. As she got older, this tradition became less frequent until COVID hit. If you ask her mom, that was the upside to COVID, having the whole family home every Friday night. Since last March they have had dinner together every Friday night. As teenagers, we often would rather hang out with our friends on Friday nights, but her family’s weekly Friday night dinners allow us to spend one special night together.

We continued to have these conversations about our family’s traditions when Julia Levy spoke with JumpSpark’s Strong Women Fellowship this spring. By day, Julia Levy leads internal communications at a startup, and pursues her side projects passions at night. She co-founded a podcast with her father called Peach and Prosperity, which discusses stories around economics, and cultural and historical stories about the Atlanta area. Julia recently spoke at TedXEmory about her various projects and how she manages to keep up with her passions, including Tradition Kitchens which she began with her mother, making kitchens into a learning space around Judaism and other cultures.

During the meeting, Julia and her Kitchen Ambassadors — Ruby, Brianna, and Lauren — talked about their experiences with the community that has been built through Tradition Kitchens. Tradition Kitchens’ classes originally took place in people’s homes throughout the Atlanta area. However, due to the pandemic, that all changed. Tradition Kitchens now has online classes you can stream or watch the recordings. They also go farther than just discussing food; they talk about the significance around the food and the history behind it. For example, for Black History month, Karon, a friend of Julia’s, made fried chicken tenders with biscuits while talking about restaurants with stories from the Civil Rights Movement. The best thing about the program is that it is volunteer-based, so anybody is able to partake as either a student ready to learn more about different cuisines or as a teacher sharing your favorite recipes. Food is a way for people to bond and gives people the opportunity to learn more about other cultures. In cities such as Atlanta there is a wide variety of people that eat different foods. There is a great opportunity for learning and laughter at Tradition Kitchens.

Rachel Binderman is an 11th grader at The Weber School, and Rebecca Kann is an 11th grader at Pace Academy. Both are Peer Leaders for JumpSpark’s Strong Women Fellowship.

Charlie Render In JumpSpark

A Day in the Life of Virtual School in America

The 2020-2021 school year has not been the easiest for anyone. Around the world, students have had to adapt to learning virtually. Many students have yet to go back to their school building since March of 2020, including me.

Every day I wake up at 7:20 am and get myself dressed and my parents drive me to my friend’s house. We go to her basement where we have two tables set up across the room from each other. We each sit at our own table. We log on to class every morning at 8:20 and have four 70 minute classes. We make lunch and eat outside so get some fresh air.

For lunch we keep kosher and we usually log on to our Jewish Culture Club meetings. At these meetings we have a rabbi teach us about each weeks torah portion. The torah portions bring up many interesting conversations. We usually have some music playing to make it a little more fun as we sit and listen to our classes.

Usually during the day I also talk to some of my camp friends. I attend a Jewish summer camp in the mountains of Georgia. Last summer was supposed to be our last summer as campers but Covid cancelled camp. So our unit has stayed connected virtually and are really looking forward to Israel this summer.

Doing school with a friend has caused less anxiety and stress by giving us some social interaction. Virtual school is not easy but I have adapted and made myself successful.

Charlie Render In JumpSpark

A Typical Day For Me As An Israeli Teen

Each day for me starts when I take my dog for a walk. Because of the pandemic I study some days though Zoom and some in school. So, I wake up every morning according to the way I study that day. Today I’ll tell you about my typical Sundays. American teens may not realize it, but Israelis go to school on Sunday! Our weekend is on Friday and Saturday because Shabbat is part of our culture and Sunday is just a regular day!

School on Sundays starts at 7:45 a.m. so I wake up at 6:20 and take my dog for a walk. When we get back, I quickly get ready for school, eat something and go out. I usually go to school on foot because it’s close to my house. My first class is English literature. English is a language I really like, so I enjoy studying it. After the English class I have a free period that I usually use to finish homework that I didn’t have time to do, eat or just sit and talk to friends. Next I have a two-hour math class and three hours of physics. I study the Bible in school, but other than that, I am not a very religious person. I enjoy hearing different interpretations of the Bible stories since some of these solutions make more sense.

I finish school at 2:50 p.m. When I get back home I eat lunch and watch Netflix or read a book until 4-5 p.m., do my homework if I have any, and after that I usually hang out with friends or go back to watch Netflix. Because of the Coronavirus I don’t have a lot of options for activities after school so my week is usually the same. At about 8:00 p.m. I have dinner with my family, then at 11/12 at night I go to bed. Sunday is a relatively free day for me, so in addition on Tuesdays for example I have an entrepreneurship and computer science course, and on Fridays I usually go to the sea to surf.

Charlie Render In JumpSpark

Judaism As Part Of My Daily Life

Judaism is a big part of my daily life, I celebrate Jewish holidays with my family, and keep the Jewish tradition in our family. For example, I want to talk about my Bar Mitzvah experience. When I turned 13 I did an “Aliyah latora” at the west wall in Jerusalem! After that, we went celebrating my Bar Mitzvah at a big restaurant with my whole family. I would never forget that experience, and to this day I wear the golden David star necklace my grandparents gave me.

The feeling of silence on Shabbat or Yom Kippur is really calming and peaceful. Those are the days when people just stop everything in their lives for a few days.

The holidays are very special for me. I meet my family, eat really good food with them, and feel festive.

When traveling with my family around the world (but also in Israel) we go to alot of places that are related to Judaism and Jewish history, and we feel the power of it.

I also feel the Jewish history in my family’s history. My grandfather and all of his family are Holocaust survivors and today, he is proud to be Jewish, and proud to be living in Israel as a Jewish person.

I am not very religious, but I try my hardest to keep holiday traditions and keep kosher.

Other then being Jewish in Israel, I have many other interests. I like music, hanging out with friends, watching movies and tv shows, and gaming.