The ‘Power’ of Jewish Camping Inspires a Dad to Get More Involved
August 4, 2005 | Read Time: 7 minutes
As a kid, I never liked summer camp. It is ironic, I know, given my support of Jewish camping activities throughout the majority of my adult life, and how often I’ve seen young people’s lives changed for the better by their involvement in youth activities. But for me, as a young boy, camp just felt a little too structured and confining. When I was about 9 or 10, I masterminded what became one of the biggest raids my camp had ever seen on the night before Visitors’ Day. I guess you could say that I was somewhat of a troublemaker.
In my senior year in high school, I started attending conferences hosted by an organization called United Synagogue
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Youth, or USY, an affiliate of the United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism, in New York. With its network of youth groups throughout the country, USY provides programs for Jewish teenagers to learn more about their heritage and develop cultural ties. Growing up, I had heard about USY, but even though my father was a rabbi, my parents never pushed me to join. They felt it was important that my siblings and I each become engaged with the Jewish community at our own pace and in ways that felt most comfortable to us.
It was when I learned more about USY that I discovered my own desire to connect. At the conferences I met so many young people who expressed to me how important these gatherings were to them because they offered a nonjudgmental space in which they could celebrate their Jewish heritage with kids from similar backgrounds. Many of them told me that they had never felt truly comfortable being themselves in their own schools or communities and that these retreats were something they always looked forward to.
Throughout my four years of college at State University of New York at Brockport, I worked as a volunteer regional field worker for USY in upstate New York and western Massachusetts. I worked mostly on weekends, helping to staff and create programming for youth conventions.
The opportunity to spend my weekends getting to know these impressionable young people and being their cheering section when they led their first Jewish study session, planned their first program, or conquered a new or challenging activity gave me a tremendous amount of joy. To think that I played some small role in helping these kids build their characters and capabilities, discover their interests, and grow a sense of pride in being Jewish was so fulfilling.
As it turned out, I met my wife, Erica, at one of the conventions that I’d helped organize. (My eldest daughter, Alison, now 19, refers to herself as a “USY Flower Child.”)
Upon graduation from college, I took a job as an inventory production manager in the women’s clothing division of Levi Strauss & Company and moved to San Francisco, but my experiences with USY always stayed with me. After about a year, when I was transferred to Oklahoma City, I met the leaders of the USY program there and they asked me to become an adviser for their local synagogue’s youth group. That volunteer position soon led me to the opportunity to become a regional field worker for the Southwest.
One of the biggest life lessons that I learned from working with USY is to never prejudge the potential of any individual, particularly youth. In working with USY, I saw the shyest, most introverted 13- and 14-year olds turn into confident, articulate young adults in a very short amount of time. Feeling connected to their peers and to a larger community gave them that confidence.
This idea of looking at people and ideas without judgment and always considering the possibilities of what can be is a philosophy that has really shaped how I have approached my 25-year-long career in the business world, my volunteer work, and my personal life as well. My favorite saying is “Why not?”
However, while USY introduced me to the power that Jewish youth groups could have on developing confident young adults, it wasn’t until about 10 years ago that I learned about the power of Jewish camping. It was my daughter, Alison, who made the introduction.
At the time, I’d been with Levi Strauss for 15 years, and was recruited to work as president of the Stride Rite Corporation, in a suburb of Boston. My wife and I sat our children down to tell them that we’d be moving. Alison, then 9, had already been signed up to go to a Jewish camp for the summer. I remember her looking at us, arms crossed, saying, “I’m not moving and there’s nothing you can say that will make me. I’ve been waiting all year to go to camp, I’m signed up, and I will be going.” There was no yelling. She was extremely matter-of-fact, but she was dead serious.
Thankfully, I found another camp, 80 miles outside of Boston. We relocated, and Alison went to camp.
When I picked her up after just four weeks, I cannot begin to describe to you the glow on her face. She had the time of her life.
You have to understand that this is a girl who had a significant Jewish background as a child. She had been to Jewish day schools, and had been very involved with the synagogue’s youth groups. But there was something about this camping experience, living 24 hours a day, seven days a week with other Jewish kids in a place where Judaism is constantly in the air, which connected her to her peers and to the culture in a powerful way. I will never forget her tears, having to leave friends she just met four weeks ago.
She continued to go to camp every year. Seeing the impact that camping had on her — and then my second daughter, and then my son — reminded me of the powerful effect that being engaged in USY activities had had on the teens I’d advised during college, and it inspired me to get more involved. I eventually became president of the camp’s board of directors, and the camp became the focus of our family’s volunteer efforts for many years.
In early 2004, I was starting to think about where I wanted to move next with my career. I had been at Stride Rite Corporation for about 10 years, and had been thinking about leaving to start my own business. Then I learned about the position at the Foundation for Jewish Camping, a nonprofit organization in New York which works with camps throughout the country to improve programming, recruitment, and capacity. Its mission is to increase the number of Jewish kids who go to summer camp yearly, with the objective of building stronger Jewish identities and commitment among them.
Once I met with the founders, Rob Bildner and Elisa Spungen Bildner, their vision and commitment was inspiring to the point where I said to myself, “I don’t know that there is another job in the Jewish community or in the nonprofit world that I would have an interest in even putting my hat in the ring for. But because of these people, because I truly share the same passion they have, I have to do this.” I was appointed president of the organization in July 2004.
My experiences have taught me so much about the importance of always giving kids the support they need to grow and flourish. There are so many opportunities out there for them, but before children can feel confident enough to go out and take advantage of those opportunities, they need us to believe in them.
