Midrasha Is Magic: What Happened When We Took Teens to L.A.

Last year at our Gala I shared with you my vision of expanding our retreat programs. The goal? To move one camp retreat a year to a heritage trip in a bigger city; immersing our teens in Jewish life, culture, and service. This year we started this initiative by travelling to Los Angeles. I thought we were going to have 20 teens sign up. We ended up with 49 teens! Gavin (our intrepid retreats director) and I stated three key educational goals. Here's how it turned out:

1. Immerse teens in a variety of Jewish ethnicities in Los Angeles

Friday night we ate Persian food (rice, kofta, chicken, and so much sumac!) while listening to the immigration story of the Davidi family. They left Iran and their beloved Jewish community in the late 1980's. We heard of the year it took them to move to the United States and what life was like for Jews in Iran prior to 1979. Now they live amidst the thriving Persian Jewish community in Los Angeles.

We also toured the Pico-Robertson neighborhood - seeing the kosher businesses, Yiddish signs, and thriving Jewish neighborhood. One teen said it felt like "being in Jerusalem."

Sam Holtzman told me, "I'm glad we got to explore a diverse culture of Jewish food in LA."

2. Engage in Meaningful Jewish Learning Unique to Los Angeles

Being in LA means we have access to Jewish educators, artists, and institutions that enable us to learn in unique ways.

We brought in Jewish artists team Isaac and Shawna Brynjegard-Bialik to lead us in a workshop about the Golem folklore - making our own Golem collages out of comic books. Arielle Damani said, "The Golem workshop expanded more on my Jewish culture that I didn't know about."

A visit to Beit T'shuvah gave us a personal perspective on Jewish healing and allyship for those suffering from addiction.

Importantly, our visit to the Museum of Tolerance enabled our teens to explore the history of the Holocaust and its starting roots in Germany. While this was an emotional and challenging part of our trip,

12th grader Zoey Wasserman shared, "I'm grateful I got to learn about the Holocaust with my close Jewish community of friends. It meant I could be vulnerable and took in a lot more than if I had gone with my public school."

3. Build Jewish Teen Friendships and Connections

We were purposeful about staying at a youth hostel where teens could be in dorm rooms of 6-10 students, alongside our educators who could help facilitate conversations and build connections. Our trip to Universal also brought joy and fun to our community.

Emme Altman said, "I connected with other Jewish kids. We got closer because we all have Judaism in common - it gives us something to connect about. I loved having fun at Universal with new and existing friends."

There are micro moments that stood out: our teens pitched in to clean up after each meal, the seniors helped the younger teens meet new people, our educational team showed up for our teens in moments of homesickness or carsickness, and watching our teens on the beach picking up shells while making new friends and enjoying the warm morning with waves rolling in the background. It all combined into four days of connection, learning, and growth.

I can't say enough amazing things about our first retreat to L.A. Thanks to those of you who helped to support our vision for Midrasha.