It happens every July just outside of São Paulo, Brazil, at the local NOAM chapter’s machané choref (winter camp). Dr. Daniel Olson, our Director of Strategic Initiatives and Research, visited Brazil this week to lead staff training sessions on disability inclusion, teach music, and learn from our colleagues in Latin America.
Read More“[Ramah New England] did everything in their capacity to make it possible for him to have this precious time with his friends and to recapture some semblance of adolescence that he’s missed over the last year.”
Read MoreAs we set into the winter month, families are facing months of unknowns. Will their children stay in virtual school, or return to in person learning? When will they next see grandparents and cousins? What will the summer look like? No one has all the answers.
Read More“This summer has provided us with countless shehecheyanu moments. Joel, thank you for helping us get to this point, for allowing 58 new campers to join the Ramah community, and for making camp happen this summer and always. I’m looking forward to a time when we can be together again, in person, at machaneinu Ramah.”
Read MoreThrough this program at Camp Ramah in Northern California, we noticed the barriers between teens and mentors, whether rabbi, cantor, rosh edah, or others, were lessened. Teens realized their mentors cared about them, made themselves available to them, and that they treasured having one-on-one conversations with them – our teens mattered.
Read More“The Tikvah virtual vocational training and socializing series offered reliability and predictability during uncertain times; it offered friendship and conversation during a summer when in-person socializing wasn’t possible. The program expanded the world of our participants.”
Read MoreA recent letter from the parents of a child in one of our Tikvah programs captures the feelings of so many in the Ramah community this summer. “Even without camp, Ramah was critical for our children, offering fun tefillot, choices of chugim, bunk and edah reunions, and great concerts. Even without camp, Ramah was there for us, and it added so much to a very challenging summer.”
Read MoreWhat are we mourning? Certainly not anything as profound as life and death itself – something we know so many others are suffering through – so what is it? So in this data-driven age of metrics, allow me to attempt to quantify the unquantifiable emotional losses of a cancelled summer
Read MoreWith the serious threat of illness facing everyone from the coronavirus, no one knows whether our precious summer camps will be able to open this summer. Such uncertainty: Might we be able to run camps as usual, or at least have a few weeks of camp in July or August? What is certain, however, is that the benefits of camp are perhaps more obvious than ever.
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