Parents of children with emotional and social challenges may hesitate when considering sending kids off to summer camp, or may forgo the idea altogether. Typical summer camp curriculum does not address their children's unique needs, and special needs camps may not be an appropriate fit.
 
This summer, Quest Camp, a unique therapeutic day camp program, will return to Pittsburgh through a continued collaboration with Squirrel Hill Psychological Services (SHPS), a division of Jewish Family & Children's Service of Pittsburgh.  Quest is designed for children ages 6 - 18 with mild to moderate emotional or social challenges and/or diagnoses including attention deficit disorder, chronic anxiety, chronic depression and high-functioning Asperger's syndrome.
 
SHPS and Quest Therapeutic Camps partnered to bring the summer camp program to the Pittsburgh area for the first time in the summer of 2012.  The original Quest camp was started in San Francisco in 1989 by child psychologist Dr. Robert Field, who has roots in the Pittsburgh area.
 
"Quest Camp is a first-of-its-kind camp in Pittsburgh. The program is different from the typical summer camp experience; it is a therapeutic program designed to address children's emotional and social needs and challenges while setting them up for future success throughout the school year, which typical summer camps are not equipped to do," said Dr. Jordan Golin, director of SHPS. "Parents should consider Quest Camp as an intensive therapeutic intervention that will have an impact all year long, and progress can be continued throughout the school year with the Quest After-School Program."
 
Quest Camp is designed to offer campers a highly-structured and therapeutic curriculum with the look and feel of a typical summer camp. Daytime activities include swimming, field trips, sports, drama, music and science, while following a cognitive-behavioral approach designed to teach skills and reinforce positive changes in behavior. The camp offers an opportunity for children to learn, grow and increase confidence within a day camp setting. Parents have reported significant improvement in areas that include self-esteem, cooperation, family relationships and conversational skills as well as overall improvement in social and emotional functioning. Continue reading here. 

Alison Laichter was recently named the new Director of Special Projects at Jewish Family Service of San Diego. In this position, she will spearhead major functions including strategic planning, community engagement, Day of Learning, and more. Alison most recently served as the Executive Director of the Jewish Meditation Center (JMC) in Brooklyn, NY.

"Alison brings a wealth of experience and strategic planning know-how to Jewish Family Service," said Dana Toppel, Chief Program Office. "Her enthusiasm and determination to engage the community will be very meaningful for the agency going forward. We are very happy to welcome her to Jewish Family Service "

Alison studied Civil Engineering at The Cooper Union and Urban Planning at Columbia University. She has worked for the United Nations Development Programme, as a Community Planner to re-imagine the entire east side of Manhattan for pedestrian and bicyclist safety, and most recently founded and directed the first grassroots and community-led Jewish Meditation Center which was based on the belief that tikkun olam (repairing the world) happens from the inside out. 

Jewish Family Services of Washtenaw County, MI unveiled its new video, "The Faces of JFS" at their Constellation JFS Celebration event on Sunday, April 21st. This 5 minute film chronicles the stories of several typical JFS clients.  It is engaging, moving, and the stories are based on actual cases. Click here to watch the video. 

Last summer, Jewish Family Service Association of Cleveland's, Families at Risk division hosted a special fashion show and luncheon to raise awareness of domestic violence and to launch its new professional training customized for local beauty salon professionals. Since then over 100 salon professionals have participated in "Know Abuse" training.
 
One professional recently shared her story with JFSA Cleveland. A client of hers confided that she was enduring verbal and emotional abuse from her husband. The professional, who had taken JFSA's training last year along with her salon colleagues, was able to help her client connect with one of JFSA's counselors. "If it hadn't been for that conversation with my stylist, I wouldn't have known that help was there for me," she recently shared with JFSA. "I am so grateful that I'm not alone in my situation anymore."
 
If you would like to have your salon receive this free training and earn continuing education credits, call Jen Roth at 216-378-3406.  

JFSA Cleveland will present Know Abuse: From Program to Social Enterprise at AJFCA's 41st Annual Conference in Phoenix, May 19th-21st.

Stay updated on AJFCA offerings, agency news & current trends . . .

 

  

2013 AJFCA Annual Conference

1. Search for the app in the app stores (iTunes or Google Play). 
2. Download using this link:  http://crwd.cc/ajfca2013. This will direct you to the download page. 
3. Download by scanning the QR Codes:
   http://crwd.cc/ajfca2013.png
   http://crwd.cc/ajfca2013.pdf
   http://crwd.cc/ajfca2013.svg 

Comprehensive Agency Survey--Deadline Extended to Today, May 3rd 

Thanks very much to so many of our member agencies who have already responded to the comprehensive survey we sent out a few weeks ago.  The deadline was extended to today, May 3rd. All agencies that complete their surveys by today will be entered into a drawing for a $50 Amazon gift card. If you have not responded, please take the time to do so. The more information we have on each member agency, the better we can serve you. If you need the survey link, please email Lisa.

Approximately half a million survivors of the Holocaust are alive today:  The largest community of survivors in the United States is in the Greater New York area - close to 73,000.   The majority of these survivors are between the ages of 73 and 85, and half of them are living in poverty.
 

In 2013, Jewish Communal Fund's Special Gift Fund granted $100,000 to the Community Initiative for Holocaust Survivors, an initiative of UJA-Federation of New York to meet the needs of this vulnerable population. Continue reading here.

JFNA Health and Long-Term Care Summit

The Jewish Federations of North America (JFNA) Health and Long-Term Care Summit is an annual meeting of volunteer and professional leadership from across the nation who are focused on how federations and their partner agencies are affected by emerging laws, regulations, and actions in this arena. We would like to invite you to a one day gathering on June 5th with a focus on the Affordable Care Act. Our focus will be on how your federation and partner agency can capitalize on emerging trends and funding within the new health reform law. Speakers will include prominent legislators and policy advisors across the political spectrum. If you have any questions, please contact Jonathan Westin.    

To register please go to the following link and choose the June 5th option.

Presidential Proclamation -- Jewish American Heritage Month, 2013

In his second year in office, President George Washington wrote a letter to the Touro Synagogue in Newport, Rhode Island -- one of our Nation's first Jewish houses of worship -- and reaffirmed our country's commitment to religious freedom. He noted that the Government of the United States would give "to bigotry no sanction [and] to persecution no assistance," and that all Americans are entitled to "liberty of conscience and immunities of citizenship." Those words ring as true today as they did then, and they speak to a principle as old as America itself: that no matter who you are, where you come from, or what faith you practice, all of us have an equal share in America's promise. Continue reading here.

The Repair Community Fellowship is part of Repair Communities, a Repair the World initiative that will engage volunteers in solving important local issues through their service in five U.S. cities. The fellowship is an incredible opportunity for creative, courageous pioneers age 21-26 who are ready to lead. Teams of Fellows will mobilize people, organizations and communities to address pressing local needs through meaningful service, tackling important issues like hunger, education, the environment, poverty and more. Sound like you? Someone you know? Learn more about Repair Community Fellows here and apply today.
 

AJFCA member agencies will likely be key community partners in this fellowship. If you have an interest in learning how your agency might better connect with Repair the World's resources, contact AJFCA Manager of Civic Engagement & Repair the World Programming Jennie Gates Beckman at 410-843-7449.

Identifying Leaders with the Performance-Potential Matrix

Once you've mapped out your nonprofit's future leadership needs, you're ready to consider whether members of your staff have the potential to move into leadership roles. This video, the second in Bridgespan's leadership development series, features the Performance-Potential Matrix tool, a tool you can use to assess an employee's current performance and the likelihood s/he can succeed in a leadership role. Continue reading here.

The Harry and Jeanette Weinberg Foundation has highlighted the initial findings of the Family and Informal Caregiver Initiative - believed to be the largest effort in the nation to identify supports and servi ces that really work.
 

Knowing that as much as 80-percent of all long-term care for chronically ill and disabled older adults is delivered by family and friends, the Weinberg Foundation launched the Caregiver Initiative in 2009. The program involved 14 organizations in nine states with total funding of nearly $15 million over its three-year span. Continue reading here.

Want a Successful Capital Campaign? Avoid These 3 Mistakes 

Since nonprofit boards can be very diverse, what are some of the key characteristics that are the same across good boards?

Two board members make their own observations in this video. These board members have been on many boards -- both good boards and bad ones. Hear some great advice on how to graciously let a board member go if you think they're no longer an asset your organization. This video is probably a good one to share with your board members and maybe even some of your staff members as well.

A Funders Guide to Supporting Nonprofit Technology: 10 Ways to Build Your Grantees' Technical Savvy 

Foundations want to maximize their investments and help ensure the success of their grantees, and the nonprofits they fund want to do the best work they can with the gifts they are given. What if Idealware told you there were a number of ways to meet all these goals beyond just writing another check? Check out A Funders Guide to Supporting Technology: 10 Ways to Build Your Grantees' Tech Savvy. Continue reading here.

Are you stuck on replay? Do you do the same things, the same way, over and over? It's easy to have this happen, and it's honestly what Katya Andersen fears most.
 

"Replay" can be somewhat effective if you're sticking to what works well. The problem is it can also create an autopilot state of mind that dulls your senses to changes around you--like shifts in the political landscape, your donor base or constituencies--that require a new approach. It's one thing to identify best practices and build on what works -- it's quite another to get too comfortable and call it in. Whole industries have fallen into habit only to be rendered irrelevant. You have to keep fine-tuning (or sometimes revolutionizing) what you do and how you do it. Continue reading here.

A Trend That Could Change Everything, Collaborations Across Generations -- And What It Means for Causes, Nonprofits and Social Enterprises, April 19, 2013, LinkedIn, by Jeffrey Walker

Here are three facts about Harvard Business School (HBS) that you probably didn't know.

1. One quarter of HBS alumni over 50 years old spend over half of their time working on social enterprise and nonprofit activities.
2. The largest club at HBS is the social enterprise club.
3. The largest conference at HBS is the social enterprise conference. 

Continue reading here.

The state of funding innovation in the Jewish community presents encouraging and discouraging realities at the same time. Los Angeles and New York are foci of innovation in the Jewish world and the vibrancy of Israel as a center of innovation is undoubted (I refer, of course, not to the high-tech sector only, but to myriad innovative social programs). Continue reading here. 

Data, Risk Aversion, and Social Investing Dominate Donors' Concerns, April 19, 2013, Chronicle of Philanthropy, by Caroline Preston

Donors often fail to research who else is financing a cause before they dive into it. That was one of many takeaways from this weeks' Global Philanthropy Forum, an annual gathering of wealthy individuals, top foundation officials, and nonprofit leaders. Continue reading here.

Busting Grant Myths 

Are these grant myths true, or are they unfounded?

Continue reading here.

When Words Fail 

Each year thousands, if not millions, will come into contact with your group. They may catch 60 seconds on the local news, see a magazine article or a friend's Facebook like. They may glimpse it on a brochure or t-shirt, or talk with a staff person or volunteer. The cumulative effect of these visits forms the experience that person has of your organization. Whether they sought you out or stumbled upon you, they will judge you; if the experience is bad or mediocre, an opportunity is lost. But if it's positive -- moves the person toward confidence and loyalty -- you may gain a lifetime friend. Continue reading here.

A Meaningful Mother's Day Gift for Loved Ones and Women in Need

Join Jewish Women International (JWI) in making Mother's Day special for some of the 35,000 women and children spending Mother's Day displaced from their homes in domestic violence shelters. Each of these survivors of violence needs and deserves our support, and we can make a difference for them while we celebrate the women we love. JWI's Mother's Day Flower Project lets you give a gift that honors everything Mom has given you -- and the person you have become because of it. Learn how to help here.