Raquel Benquiat, a 32-year-old San Diegan from Mexico City, says that many of her peers are disconnected from their Jewish identities. But when they leave home and see the global Jewish perspective through Entwine they often reconnect.
“More and more of our generation understands that what’s happening in India can affect me. We understand that we are all interconnected. Entwine is the only Jewish organization that really taps into that concept of a global Jewish community,” said Benquiat, founder and former co-chair of Entwine’s San Diego planning committee.
“You open up to Judaism and that never leaves you. You feel, ‘Oh, God! I am Jewish, and there is tradition behind me, and all these people around the world are doing similar things that I do, as a Jew. I should do more, make Judaism a stronger part of me,’ ” she added.
JDC Entwine — the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee’s young adult engagement platform — has engaged more than 12,000 young Jewish adults, many of them previously disconnected, and it’s growing quickly. The organization received a $3 million grant from the S.F.-based Jim Joseph Foundation and was honored in Slingshot’s 2014-2015 Washington, D.C. innovator’s guide. Its combination of service, education and leadership opportunities is becoming a model for recharging the Jewish identities of hard-to-reach young adults.
Executive director Sarah Eisenman — who utilized her experience and interests as a passionate, but largely unaffiliated, young Jewish adult to create Entwine — said the organization is “catalyzing a generation of young Jews to live a life of action with global Jewish responsibility at the core.”
Entwine’s innovative strategic partnerships enable it to reach a large, diverse group of future Jewish leaders.
For example, in June 2015, Entwine announced a partnership with Genesis Philanthropy Group to launch the first global Jewish service program crafted for Russian-speaking Jewish young people. Selected participants travel together on service trips and then return to their communities to plan programs that appeal to a Russian-speaking audience.
Twenty-four-year-old Lizzy Solovey of Baltimore is one of the participants. She recently traveled to Argentina with a group of Russian-speaking peers.
“It was so amazing to see how resilient the Jewish community is there after the economic crisis. It was even more powerful to go to Argentina with a Russian group, because our story resonates with theirs. They are not immigrants, but they are rebuilding their lives in the same way our parents and we did,” said Solovey, who now works as a Jewish communal professional. “We had wonderful discussions about what it means to be Jewish and Russian. Coming back, I realized how important it is that I stay involved — to be proud of where I come from and of where I am and to keep giving back.”
A second $4 million partnership between Entwine and BBYO — which includes lead funding from the Schusterman and William Davidson Foundations — is enabling young adults who were formerly involved in the BBYO youth movement to take part in service fellowships, using the skills they learned as teen leaders. It is estimated that as many as 80 percent of teens disengage from the Jewish community after their bar/bat mitzvah. Almost as many drop out during the college years.
“This is a unique collaboration because it leverages the best of what Entwine, JDC and BBYO have to offer,” Eisenman said, pointing to Entwine’s one-year Global Jewish Service Corps. The volunteers use their pre-existing skill sets to work with teens from around the world, which leads to more young adults serving and members of teen movements staying involved, and brings a pluralistic Jewish perspective to more traditional communities.
Moishe House has also partnered with JDC Entwine for several years. The collaboration has benefited both organizations: Moishe Houses serve as platforms for Entwine educational events, and often Entwine participants get involved in Moishe Houses on their return from abroad. Globally, the two organizations have developed Moishe Houses in overseas Jewish communities.
Entwine has also had an impact on JDC, which changed its bylaws to create a two-year board position for someone in their 20s or 30s who will bring a new perspective to the organization’s strategy.
“People talk about experiential learning. This will be experiential leadership,” Eisenman quipped.
Benquiat highlights what she feels is JDC Entwine’s secret sauce: entrepreneurialism.
“Entwine is not a pet project for the larger organization. No one dictates what we can and should do. We own what we do, and we feel responsible for our own programs,” she said.
Will it last? That is something that Eisenman says she is shouldering. As part of the Jim Joseph grant, Entwine will embark on a long-term data-mining project to evaluate the short-term and long-term success of its current initiatives and help inform future offerings.
“We care deeply about evaluation and data. We know the model is good; Entwine has done internal surveys,” said Dawne Bear Novicoff, assistant director of the Jim Joseph Foundation. “But Entwine has not had the resources to evaluate it. … Entwine will hire a new staff person to focus on measurement and outcomes to track and analyze the data it is already collecting.”
Powerful. Authentic.
Said Eisenman: “We have built. Now, we are taking everything we built and putting it on a whole new level.”