By Ryan Torok September 6, 2017 Danny Mishkin had just one question for the 14 teens and tweens in his Sababa Surf Camp in Malibu over Labor Day weekend: “What’s your sababa level?” Sababa is Hebrew slang for “cool,” “all good,” “no worries.” At Sababa Surf Camp, a New York-based camp for tweens and teens combining surfing with [...]

By Adam Smith In 2009, Jewish Teen Initiative – Boston (JTI), then known as the North Shore Teen Initiative (NSTI), launched in the 23 cities and towns just north of Boston as an innovative, first-of-its-kind program aimed at addressing the alarming trend of teens disconnecting from their Jewish faith and community after Bar/Bat Mitzvah. Now, a little more than [...]

By Deborah Meyer and Jeff Tiell The teen years have always been a challenge. Figuring out who you are; navigating complex social systems; being pressed to succeed academically; a body that changes from day to day – almost no adult would willingly return to adolescence. In our intense modern world, with a 24/7 fishbowl of social [...]

By Darren Schwartz Darren Schwartz NEW YORK — In my last column I identified a major challenge in Jewish teen engagement the stems from a disconnect in the values and traditions associated with bar/bat mitzvah. The ceremony that symbolizes a child’s commitment to live a Jewish life relies on an implicit notion that he or she [...]