Moishe House expands efforts to engage more young Jewish adults
Seeking to build its global community of post-collegeage Jews and attract a wider spectrum of Jewish young adults, Moishe House is bringing together and empowering its millennial Jewish leaders to strategize new ways to expand and redefine their community.
Moishe House recently convened three intensive conferences of some 300 community builders from more than 20 countries, and, for the first time, is planning a fourth gathering of over 30 Moishe House residents and alumni from across Latin America in Buenos Aires in November.
Moishe House provides opportunities for collaboration and learning to empower their residents and devise new strategies for building a global community of young adult Jewish leaders.
With two conferences last month, Moishe House residents and Moishe House Without Walls (MHWOW) hosts came together for a North American training conference dubbed “Natty Con” in Ortonville, Michigan, and an international training conference called “Internatty Con” in London to discuss issues like exploring individual leadership, new approaches to teamwork and building sustainable communities.
Moishe House Chief Global Officer Alejandro Okret said, “Internatty Con is the time of the year when we bring together Moishe House residents living in our global communities so they can celebrate all the work they do throughout the year. This is an opportunity for them to learn and to strengthen their leadership skills, as they’ll be bringing them back to their communities.”
Internatty Con 2018 was made possible with the support of Genesis Philanthropy Group (GPG), which also funds Moishe House communities in London and around the world. “Moishe House provides a unique opportunity for young adults to engage with their Jewish identity in a relevant, accessible and inclusive way. Its strength lies in its adaptability to local specificities and circumstances around the world, while at the same time creating a global community. This is especially apparent at Internatty Con 2018, which GPG is proud to support, along with Moishe Houses in London and around the world,” GPG Director of Strategy and Operations Marina Yudborovsky, said.
Each year more than 1,500 Moishe House community builders in over 27 countries across six continents – from Brazil to Sweden to China – create their own Jewish programs for Jewish young adults ages 22-32.
What began as an impromptu Shabbat dinner in an Oakland, California, apartment in 2006, Moishe House has more than doubled in the number of houses since 2010, and now hosts over 10,000 programs engaging over 60,000 unique participants each year.