In early June 2013 Federation hosted Miryam Rosenzweig, the Director of Next Gen initiatives at the Detroit Jewish Federation. Miryam met with a broad cross-section of the St. Louis Jewish community, including the Federation’s Board of Trustees, community leadership committed to engaging young adults, Campaign Cabinet members and Federation and community professionals.

The response of those who met with Miryam was generally positive. The model that she shared and the ideas that she articulated from Detroit excited her audiences and helped focus our own thoughts and ideas around reaching the Next Gen in St. Louis. Federation’s 2010 strategic plan has clearly emphasized the necessity of reaching this population. Miryam made clear that there are multiple ways to engage this cohort ranging from outreach to the unengaged, as well as retaining current and attracting new members to our community.

At the same time we were able to see areas that our own approach might differ from Miryam’s. These included a more dynamic partnering with synagogues and in more substantive Judaic content along. These would combine with the more social efforts that have been so successful in Detroit.

As we reflect on the work now being done in Detroit and other cities, and as we envision our community’s own needs, we are in broad agreement with the need to move forward in a more formal way with a Next Gen model for our own community. We know that we want the model to be staffed with energetic and visionary professionals to resonate with and inspire the Next Gen. At the same time in creating our own Next Gen model our intention is to provide greater content, partnering with and supporting our synagogues and agencies.

We also must recognize that this work is not beginning from scratch; it builds on the efforts and successes of existing programs throughout our community including Next Dor, Moishe House, Hillel, the Karen Solomon Initiative, JCRC’s Student to Student programs and many other great programs. And when we add the ongoing programs at the JCC and our synagogues, we have to acknowledge the strong foundation on which we can build. Indeed, one of Miryam’s observations during her visit is that we are building on a very strong foundation.

So where do we go from here? Thanks the generosity of the Staenberg Family Foundation, we will be able to take a first step by hiring a director of a Next Gen initiative; a job description is now posted here.

Our intention is to find someone with real vision and energy, innovation and creativity to strengthen all of our community efforts. Once on board, this person would work with our current staff to develop a staffing plan and model that leveraged our own strength’s to meet the needs of our community. Together we will build a response that creates opportunities for people to live meaningful Jewish lives, and ultimately continue to generate the resources necessary to continue to thrive together.