By Emma Stein
JUMP, Jewish Unity Mentoring Project, is a national leadership program for Jewish high school students across the country. It is a program to teach Jewish teenagers about leadership and Judaism and what it means to help others.
JUMP has taught us to become leaders in our own communities and has shown us that a little kindness can go a long way. In JUMP, all the kids help create different events that will benefit their community and help them in the long run. In this competition, the JUMP group had to take on five challenges: Israel advocacy, bullying, the Holocaust, Jewish values, and fundraising.
For the Israel advocacy event, the Seattle group asked Rabbi David Olesker to come and speak about Israel advocacy to Jewish high students and parents and at Northwest Yeshiva High Shcool. For the bullying event, the group made “INSECURI-T” t-shirts. Many of the JUMP participants and students from local schools wrote their insecurities on the front of their t-shirts, and on the back created a positive statement. For the Holocaust event, the group made a video presentation of Holocaust survivor Paula Stern telling her story, and they shared her story with the Jewish Student Union clubs in the area. Afterwards, the groups had conversations about the importance of learning about the Holocaust and the importance of passing the stories down through families.
For the Jewish values event, the JUMP group showed a pre-screening of the new “Hunger Games” movie, “Catching Fire,” and we had everyone bring canned goods to the event. The JUMP group donated them to Jewish Family Service.
Lastly, for the fundraiser event, the Seattle JUMP group decided to raise money for the Orly Ohayon Recovery Fund. Orly Ohayom is an NCSYer in Jacksonville, Fla. who was hit by a car while walking to synagogue for Kol Nidre services. To fundraise for Orly, the group had a Chinese double feature movie night for families. The Chinese night event is going to now become a permanent event for Seattle NCSY.
The Seattle JUMP program won the whole competition in the New York boardroom! JUMP has taught many of us about different ways we can educate the people in our area but also the people around the nation about Judaism and generosity. Congratulations to the Seattle JUMP team: Richelle Willner-Martin, Julia Applebaum, Emma Stein, Gabi Benisti, Sara Green, Corrine Malachi, Ruth Boldor, Abbi Weiss and Shira Puterman, who were mentored by Nina Garkavi, Ari Hoffman, and Zach Grashin on their great win.
JUMP meets during Jewish High on Wednesday night at the Stroum Jewish Community Center on Mercer Island. For more info please visit www.jewishhighseattle.com.
Emma Stein is a 10th grader at Mercer Island High School.