This idea of sustaining growth had particular resonance for us at the Foundation, as we have experienced the opportunities of second-stage sustainability and the importance of adaptability in organizational growth first-hand. Over the past months, we have restructured two of our core grantees at key moments of their evolution. This has already yielded exciting results, and it is a lesson we are eager to share with our community this year.  

The Bronfman Youth Fellowships in Israel (BYFI) is a diverse community of nearly 1000 Jews from both North America and Israel between the ages of 17-42, who contribute their talents and vision to the Jewish community and the world at large. This year, BYFI demonstrated great flexibility and creativity as it embarked on an organizational shift from an executive director model to one of a co-directorship that would support its growing alumni community and its impact in the world, while maintaining the quality of education and centrality of Jewish learning for both the alumni network and the summer Fellowship. BYFI is now entrusted to dynamic and visionary co-directors, Becky Voorwinde and Mishael Zion, who will continue to grow, enrich and deepen BYFI. This process offers a new model of adaptability and leadership that we have already seen inspire new energy and thinking for BYFI. 

For 15 years, The Curriculum Initiative (TCI) was the premiere organization providing Jewish resources, student leadership opportunities and cultural programming on independent high school campuses. TCI spent years creating a market, establishing a successful national program and cultivating deep communal roots. Over time, it developed an innovative and effective strategy for working with some of the most unaffiliated teens in the country and formed deep connections in the communities in which it was active. At this stage in TCI's development, it became clear that transitioning TCI from one central, national organization into local institutions would allow it to more deeply penetrate the intended market while increasing its financial sustainability. In a culmination of a multi-year process of engaging stakeholders both on the ground and on an institutional level, TCI's national infrastructure was dismantled and the local regions spun-out into independent entities. TCI's work in the San Francisco Bay Area was welcomed as part of the  Bureau of Jewish Education of San Francisco, Marin County and the Peninsula  (BJE), while The Center for Jewish Education  (CJE) took on TCI's program in Baltimore.

Both BYFI and TCI offer models of how to foster growth and development while being attuned to the changing needs and the life stage of an organization. Throughout these processes, each of these organizations was open to new directions that eventually led it to a state of greater strength and sustainability.

In 2011, seven of our grantees were included in the annual Slingshot Resource Guide for Jewish Innovation.  MyJewishLearning's  (MJL) was awarded first place for Outstanding Website from the American Jewish Press Association for the second year in a row. MJL also launched three new blogs, which I invite you to read more about below.