JOIN for Justice

Hello Dan! Tell us about what you’re up to these days.

Absolutely! So I left my job of ten years, which was actually my JOIN placement, at Dorchester Bay Youth Force, doing youth organizing work. I left back in the end of June, and I’ve been doing a variety of projects. The one that’s been most on my mind and taking up most of my time has been a project working with longtime JOIN friend and trainer Rabbi David Jaffe, who wrote a book called Changing the World from the Inside Out, looking at Jewish spirituality and social justice, and how those two things work together. I’ve been working with him since the beginning of September, taking the book and trying to bring it into the world, doing some strategizing, relationship building, designing some trainings around it, and some fundraising to take the book and mold it into a larger project.

How did you discover JOIN?

Let’s see, how did I find the Fellowship? I heard about it from a variety of sources just growing up in the Jewish community in Boston. I think maybe even my mom, she would read the Jewish Advocate, and saw an article about it a long time ago. At the time I wasn’t interested, I moved to New York after college, and I think then I connected to Lauren Herman at the Workmen’s Circle – which was her JOIN placement I believe – and she mentioned it to me. Then I was planning to move back to Boston and needed something to do, and I looked into it and ended up applying. That was my first connection to JOI (at the time), and as I mentioned my placement was Dorchester Bay, at the program there called Youth Force – this was 2007. I was 27, on the older end, I think the oldest person in my cohort that year.

Did that impact your experience at all?

Yeah, I think it did. You know, it’s hard to tell. I got so much out of the Fellowship, and I’m sure a lot of people do, so I don’t think that’s so unique. But maybe what I got out of it was shaped by the fact that I had some experience, I had taught in a public school in Brooklyn for three years, and that was a really really challenging experience for many reasons. I had that as my background going into my JOIN year. So I’m sure that particular experience, and whatever growth or maturity I gained through it, shaped the way I was initially attracted to community organizing.

Is there a story or experience from your Fellowship that has stayed with you?

For sure, yeah. This is the story I usually tell about one of the most meaningful parts of my year. When Meir trained – early in the year, I think it was October – trained on how to share our story, it was a deeply transformative experience for me. I think, first and foremost, because it really made my story into something that was important, something that ought to be developed. I’d come into social justice work not really thinking that my story was worthwhile or legitimate or important, and it was just really empowering for me to center myself and my story, and then to learn the craft of developing a story and sharing a story in a one on one meeting, that was a really powerful experience. And that still absolutely sticks with me, ten years later, as I continue to do one on ones for my current project, how am I sharing my story and how am I getting people to relate to me. That was really meaningful.

Lastly, is there a piece of organizing wisdom and / or a Jewish teaching that inspires you?

There’s something from my current work, a Jewish concept, of shleimut, or wholeness. And I’ve been thinking a lot about what does it mean for us to bring our full selves to our lives, and then more specifically to our social justice work. And I think a lot of times what happens is we bifurcate ourselves and say ‘OK you’re a spiritual person in synagogue, and you’re an intellectual person in the classroom,’ and just divide ourselves. And I’m really thinking a lot about how that’s not the healthiest way to live, and how can we develop a sense of wholeness, and then bring our whole selves. And what sort of environments encourage that and don’t encourage that, and what are some skills. I think that’s why I love David’s book. What are some skills that we can learn to develop a sense of wholeness and then bring our whole selves into the world.

Dan Gelbtuch is a community organizer and Jewish Organizing Fellowship alum ’07-08. Learn more about the Jewish Organizing Fellowship.

Hello Emilia! Tell us about your recent work.

I am the Executive Director of Jeremiah Program Boston, which is the Boston branch of the national organization called Jeremiah. We work with low-income single moms and their kids, to help families break the cycle of poverty two generations at a time. We are based in Roxbury, and in my role as Executive Director I spend most of my time fundraising [laughter], but also we’re a relatively new organization to Boston, so I spend a fair amount of time in program development, helping to build our program, and really refine our model here in the city. And I do some staff supervision and some direct service helping families. But most of my time is spent on fundraising and program development, big picture sort of work.

What led you to do the JOIN Organizing Fellowship?

I was coming back to Boston after living out of the state for a while, and I was really looking for community. And I was looking to dive further into how Judaism and social justice intersected for me, and it had been recommended to me by a couple of the board members [laughter], people that I really trust said they thought I should apply, so I did!

What was one highlight or memorable experience?

I think the most important thing I got out of JOIN was the relationships with my cohort — I made some really great friends who will probably be my friends for life. And I also learned a lot from my cohort, particularly around some issues I hadn’t thought about like disability rights. I learned a lot about unions and the labor movement because of my colleagues who were working in that space, even though I wasn’t, they were, and they shared their wisdom. And then relationships with alumni, with staff, with speakers that came in — one of those speakers has become a mentor to me. So the relationships have been the biggest thing that I’ve gotten.

Could you share a piece of organizing and/or Jewish wisdom that you learned through your fellowship?

One thing that I walked away with is that the one-to-one training, and understanding how those conversations work, is something that you will use, not only in your personal life but really in any professional space you go into. The ways that you learn to learn about people is something that’s truly applicable anywhere. I find it particularly in organizing that it links to development or fundraising. So in organizing you’re asking for someone’s time, and in fundraising you’re asking for someone’s money. So it is different, but it’s not that different.

Emilia Diamant is Executive Director of Jeremiah Program Boston and a Jewish Organizing Fellowship alum ’12-13. Learn more about the Jewish Organizing Fellowship.

Laura Horwitz is having a conversation about race.

In fact, she’s having many conversations about race. In St. Louis, one of the most racially segregated cities in the country, Laura is organizing predominantly white families to confront racial inequity, white privilege, and diversity… through children’s books.

Laura, a Jewish Organizing Fellow from 2003 – 2004, started her organization, We Stories, to find a new way for addressing one of the most challenging subjects in our country today — and the response has been astounding. An increasingly widening circle of families, 550 and counting, are now consciously engaging with racism in their homes, with their children, as a community, and as vocal constituents in their local democracy. Currently a group from We Stories is studying the Ferguson Report together to determine what kind of action they can take as a community to make change.

JOIN alumni like Laura Horwitz are using their organizing training and mentoring to change the conversation on social justice across the country.

Please consider supporting JOIN with a gift today!