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Boosting

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Adult Education

Mini-courses held at the JCCs will offer
Jewish learning for everyone.

JULIE WIENER

Staff Writer

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32 Detroit Jewish News

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A

his year, Detroit Jews will
have their choice of 60 mini-
courses to get them through
the winter doldrums.
The Jewish Community Center of
Metropolitan Detroit and the Agency
for Jewish Education are teaming up to
offer Seminars in Adult Jewish
Education (SAJE), two three-week
semesters of entry-level classes taught on
a volunteer basis by local rabbis and
educators from all streams of Judaism.
Offered on weeknights at both cam-
puses of the JCC from late January
through mid-March, the one-hour-a-
week classes range from "The Nature
and Development of Halachah" to "The
Music of the Contemporary Jewish
Youth Movements" to "A Secular
Approach to Torah."
The lay leaders chairing the effort,
JCC Vice President Irwin Alterman and
AJE President Lynda Giles, say the pro-
gram's goal is to generate excitement
about adult Jewish education. They are
hoping the program attracts a large
number of people from a wide range of
backgrounds.
Alterman said details about market-
ing, evaluation and follow-up have not
yet been finalized, but the program,
which is sponsored by The Jewish News
and the Jewish Federation of
Metropolitan Detroit, will definitely be
advertised in The Jewish News and publi-
cized through synagogues and mailings.
Should SAJE prove successful this
year it might become an annual or even
more than an annual event, said Giles.
"We'll be interested in the reactions of
participants. Maybe there will be a need
for more intensive classes and longer ses-
sions," she added.
"If it's a success we're going to repeat
it either as is or some improved version,"
said Alterman. "The community,
through the involvement of lecturers
and participants, will essentially vote
whether this is a worthwhile endeavor."
Beth Abraham Hillel Moses Rabbi
Aaron Bergman, who will be teaching a

SAJE class on Jewish folklore, hopes the
program leads to further community-
wide adult education programming.
"Hopefully, this will be more than a
one-shot thing and can build into some-
thing, maybe get back to what the
Midrasha [AJE's adult education depart-
ment] used to be. It's a step in the right
direction." Bergman also teaches
through Eilu v'Eilu, a consortium of
Conservative synagogues offering com-
munity-wide adult courses.
SAJE comes on the heels of an evalu-
ation performed by the Jewish
Education Service of North America
that found widespread dissatisfaction
with the AJE's efforts in adult Jewish
•►
education. However, with its emphasis
on entry-level classes, SAJE does not
appear to address the evaluation's main
critique that "there is no developmental
progression for adult learners and that
nearly every offering is entry-level.
(Respondents) are dissatisfied with the
lack or limited availability of ongoing
higher-level, more intensive Jewish edu-
cation or efforts to create a more con-
••
ducive climate for it."
SAJE is modeled on Jewish U, a pro-
gram that the Atlanta Jewish
Community Center has offered for five
years. According to Nancy Lipsey, the
Atlanta JCC's director of Jewish learning
programs, Jewish U attracted 600 stu-
dents last year and aims for 1,000 this
year.
"The idea is for you to take a class
with someone, then find out how you
can learn with them year-round. It's a
taste fest," said Lipsey. The Atlanta JCC
pays its instructors — rabbis, visiting
scholars, Emory University professors
and Jewish day school teachers — $30
an hour, "not as much as they're worth,"
said Lipsey. Jewish U's tuition last year
was $20 per course for JCC members
and $25 for non-members.
Leaders coordinating SAJE did not
disclose the program's budget, but noted
that, because teachers will be unpaid,
funds would go mainly toward adminis-
trative and marketing expenses. Students
will be charged $10 per course or $25
for an unlimited amount of courses.

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