JCC Blog

Celebrating Jewish Holidays with Our ECEC Children

How do you begin to teach preschool children about the Jewish holidays?

In the Fall of 2017, members of the JCC’s Early Childhood Education Center team assembled a beautiful document providing answers to that question.  Over the course of six months, they developed a resource guide for fellow JCC teachers entitled: Chageinu: Our Celebrations!: An Early Childhood Education Curricular Resource for Teaching Holidays.

The principal authors behind Chageinu were Judy Bickford, Assistant Director of the Meyerhoff ECEC, Staci Katz, Early Childhood Educator (who conceived the idea), and Rabbi Jessy Dressin.

According to Judy, “In creating this text, we wanted to develop a dynamic, growing document. We published it in the form a notebook, so everything is removable. We can add to it as the need arises, or we can subtract from it.”

The...

JCC Executive Assistant Saadya Barron Brings Warm Touch to J Executive Suite

It’s no company secret, but most folks inside and outside the J know that if you want to reach members of the JCC Executive Team, the best route is to go through Saadya Barron, the JCC Executive Team’s Executive Assistant.

Fortunately, Saadya is one of the kindest, warm-hearted, and endearing individuals you will ever meet, so we’re all in luck.

Beyond Saadya’s role as the J’s executive point of contact, Saadya formulates and implements office activities and procedures in support of the J’s executives.

Saadya recently spearheaded an internal changeover of the J’s meeting management system; she works on event and hospitality planning, security setup and logistics, and supports the executive team and the JCC Board of Directors.  With all the work she does coordinating event logistics...

When Love and Religion Mingle

Are you in a Jewish interfaith relationship? Do you need help navigating the challenges and opportunities of love and religion?

The JCC and Jewish Community Services (JCS) are thrilled to be offering an exciting new workshop entitled Love & Religion, which seeks to create a safe, welcoming environment encouraging Jewish interfaith couples to examine their hopes and fears about the role that a Jewish identity will play in their life.

In this four-session workshop, couples that are seriously dating, engaged, or newly married will meet and share perspectives with each other to address similar questions.

The program was created by Marion Usher, an interfaith couples expert. It will be led by Beth Land Hecht, LCSW-C, Senior Manager, Community Engagement, for...

We Take Harassment Seriously

At the JCC we pride ourselves on creating a respectful culture for all, both as a workplace for our staff, and as an organization serving a community of members. As such, the J values diversity and inclusion in both its programs and policies, among staff, and towards its members.

“In this age of heightened awareness about workplace discrimination we wanted to make clear to our members that the JCC does not tolerate harassment or unwelcome behavior of any kind, whether verbal, physical, or visual,” explains JCC Chief Executive Officer Barak Hermann. “Harassment that interferes with a member or guest’s enjoyment of JCC facilities is also not tolerated, period.”

The J’s Human Resources team recently facilitated management trainings for all JCC staff on identifying and preventing discriminatory and harassing behaviors. The training was conducted, in part, to establish that the JCC...