By Leyna Krow, Assistant Editor, JTNews
Free trips to Israel don’t come cheap.
Since 2000, Taglit-Birthright Israel has sent more than 220,000 Jews between the ages of 18-26 on 10-day trips to Israel, at no cost to participants. But now, with application rates at an all time high, Birthright, having lost money both from the effects of the recession and through investments with Bernard Madoff, is struggling to meet the demand. This past summer, Birthright was only able to accommodate 30 percent of the 38,000 people who applied to go on trips. In Seattle, there were 391 applicants for just 99 spots.
Now, in an effort to increase the number of trips for Seattle young adults, the Jewish Federation of Greater Seattle is partnering with the Birthright Israel Foundation for a local fundraising campaign.
On Dec. 1, at a meeting at a private home on Mercer Island, Federation staff and Birthright trip alumni educated potential donors about the impact Birthright trips can have on the lives of participants.
According to a 2009 study conducted by Brandeis University in conjunction with Birthright Israel, Jewish young adults who go on Birthright trips are 60 percent more likely to marry a Jewish partner than their peers who have not been on trips. They are also 25 percent more likely to report feeling “very much” connected to Israel, and 73 percent considered their trip a life-changing experience.
Numbers don’t mean a whole lot without personal stories to back them up, however. Hannah Zommick, planning and community affairs coordinator for the Jewish Federation, went on a Birthright trip when she was 18. She, along with two other Birthright alumni, shared her impression of traveling to Israel for the first time and what the experience meant to her and her fellow trip-mates.
“There were a lot of people on my trip who, for them, this was the first Jewish thing they had done,” Zommick recalled. “I have a friend in that situation who said she started feeling Jewish in Israel and that was great for her.”
Zommick said she counts her Birthright trip as a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity and said that the experience opened other doors for her, including the chance to return to Israel the following winter for a volunteer program.
“It’s almost like I got two trips out of it, when I don’t think I would have had an opportunity to go to Israel at all if I didn’t go with Birthright,” she said.
According to Tana Senn, director of communications at the Jewish Federation, from the 30 people in attendance at the Dec. 1 meeting, the Federation and Birthright Israel collected $30,000 in donations. At the time JTNews went to press, the joint initiative had received an additional $10,000.
The impetus for the special fundraising campaign in Seattle is a nationwide challenge grant that has been offered to Birthright Israel by the Adelson Family Foundation in Las Vegas. The grant will match however much money Birthright Israel can raise. Senn noted that the funds raised in Seattle will be dedicated specifically for sending Seattle young adults to Israel.
This fundraising campaign is something of a unique project for the Jewish Federation of Greater Seattle, but one that Jewish Federation past president Robin Boehler said will likely be replicated in the future. Traditionally, the Federation runs one large community campaign a year, and the money collected from that annual campaign is then distributed among the Federation’s partner agencies without donors having a say in how much of their contribution goes to each recipient.
However, with the Birthright campaign, donors know exactly where their money is going.
“We saw this as a way to engage people who might not be interested in giving to the annual campaign,” Boehler said. “This is for them, as well as for our regular donors, to give additionally for a specific project.”
Boehler added she isn’t aware of any other federations around the country that have made use of single-recipient campaigns, but she thinks that for Seattle, they could be very successful programs. She anticipates the Federation running similar campaigns in the coming year.