Give The Gift of Education - with Matching Grant!

All children deserve a safe and welcoming environment in which to learn and socialize - a place to laugh with friends, learn from qualified teachers and explore their world. This is something we take for granted in the West, and something children and families have struggled with in Israel’s Sha’ar HaNegev region. Although the “Gate to the Negev” is green and thriving, its citizens are still under constant threat of rocket fire from neighboring Gaza.

You can be a part of this critical initiative and our partnership with Sha’ar HaNegev Educational Village. We secured a $50,000 match to help us meet our goal of completing the Arts Center inthe New Educational Village in Sha’ar HaNegev.

Scheduled to open in Spring 2012, the Sha’ar HaNegev Educational Village Arts Center is part of a educational campus designed to withstand rocket attacks and provide a first-class learning environment for K-12. Planned to accommodate 1,800 students and faculty, the Educational Village will provide a safe environment to learn, grow and celebrate Jewish life without fear, where parents will feel comfortable sending their children to school.

Fueling Innovation, Enabling a Brighter Future: The Negev Funding Coalition's Renewable Energy Program

Down in Israel's south, an area associated with the paralyzing thickness of desert heat, a region which receives nine inches of rain a year at best, a marvelous enterprise is being launched. Israel's Negev, the desert which covers over half the country, is the area of upcoming technological innovation and the site of an innovative new project for Jewish Federation of North America's Negev Funding Coalition.


The Jewish Federation of San Diego is proud to be a part of this innovative project, and are partnering to secure a vibrant, and sustainable Jewish future in southern Israel. 

Read more about this amazing project at:

http://www.jewishfederations.org/Renewable-Energy-Program.aspx

Fay's Story - Jewish Federation of San Diego County

See how your Federation contributions are making a World of Difference to Faye.

Isn't she adorable!?

Israeli Company Brings ‘Solar Windows’ to Wisconsin

Israel-based firm Pythagoras Solar has completed installing the world’s first “solar windows” that simultaneously generate electricity through solar power and also optimize the daylight coming through the windows, the company announced this week. The 20 windows were successfully integrated into the Organic Valley headquarters building in La Farge,Wisconsin. With the new windows, workers inside the building are able to turn off artificial lights during the daytime, as the windows bring diffused natural light, instead of glare, into the building, the company said.

“By adopting these innovative windows, we are also helping to pave the way for this technology, which has the merit to become a standard in the design and construction of net zero energy buildings,” said Cecil Wright, vice president of sustainability and local operations at Organic Valley, in a statement released by Pythagoras.

via @ISRAEL21c http://www.jpost.com/Headlines/Article.aspx?id=255325

When a Nokia phone goes off during his performance at a Jewish Orthodox synagogue in Presov, Slovakia, Lukáš Kmit keeps his cool, uses the ringtone as inspiration.

Heart to Heart - A Woman's Journey to Israel

Seventeen women from San Diego will travel to Israel on February 1st for a 10 day experience of a lifetime. The women will explore Jerusalem for three days including celebrating Shabbat in the Old City and then a visit to our partnership community of Shaar HaNegev. The group will then join 150 participants on the Jewish Federations of North America (JFNA) National Women’s Philanthropy Heart to Heart Mission for five additional days of touring and site visits to programs that are changing the face of Israeli society. The women will return back to San Diego inspired, invigorated and empowered, all with a better understanding of the incredible work of the Federation.

As one past participant said: “I came to Israel for the first time on the Heart to Heart Mission and it changed everything: how I felt as a Jew, how I felt about Israel, and how I felt about Federation.”

The mission is co-chaired by Women’s Philanthropy Board members and veteran mission participants, Juli Bear and Amy Morris. We wish these women a wonderful experience in Israel and look forward to hearing all about their trip while they are still in Israel.


Federation will run a live blog from the women on the mission! Check our website to connect to their live blog starting February 2nd through February 10th!

San Diego Food Bank Doing a World of Good

Our friends at the Jacobs & Cushman San Diego Food Bank just announced this great event to do a world of good for hungry children in our community! More information is available on their website, and posted after the break!

Federation Partners Making a World of Difference in Haiti

Two years after the devastating earthquakes shook Haiti, Federation and it's partners are doing a world of good! More news after the break from our friends at JDC!

Israel and Rosa Parks

The late Rosa Parks is well-known to students of history. In 1955 in Montgomery, Parks, who was black, refused to obey a bus driver's order to give up her seat to make room for a white passenger. Her actions led to the famed Montgomery Bus Boycott.


Israel, as a story posted today on the Wall Street Journal website notes, is facing its own bus controversy over the segregation of women for religious reasons. The report, like other stories on the issue, includes a reference to Parks. "For years, Israeli women have been pressured into moving to the rear of public buses serving strictly religious Jews. Now, in confrontations reminiscent of the era of Rosa Parks, women are pushing back," the story begins. The bus controversy is a tough issue for Israel, a democracy that continues to seek a balance between influential ultra-religious forces and its progressive, liberal ideals. This is not the first such clash in Israel's history, nor will it likely be the last. Israel, like our own great nation, is an imperfect country that at times has to struggle and work through unpleasant and challenging issues.

Click here for the WSJ Story