Cover Story/Sports

Left: Ben Kaplan, 13, of
Farmington Hills
gets a dribbling tip
om soccer coach. Ed
Raykhinshteyn.

**4 .0

Below: Cary Rosen, 14,
of Commerce Township
warms up with the
soccer ball.

help people and it makes you feel
real good."
The table tennis team spent one
Sunday morning packaging, sorting,
and passing out food at Yad Ezra,
the kosher food bank in Oak Park.
"It's a great service to the commu-
nity," says table tennis coach Roger
Black of Farmington Hills, "and it
fits in with the feeling of Maccabi
and community service. It was good
for the kids to see the people and
how helpful this is." Another goal of
the mitzvah program is to promote
team unity. "It brought us together
as a team and helped us to
bond,"says Brandon Schram.
The mitzvah program is an exten-
sion of the Day of Caring/Day of
Sharing, which takes place during
the Games. In 1997, the Milwaukee
delegation began the program, with
participants spending half a day
doing a mitzvah project in the host

Far left: Michael Goode, 16, of
Bloomfield Hills returns the volley.

Below: Brad Snider, 13, of West
Bloomfield checks his record with
table tennis coach Roger Black.

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2001

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city. The teams work together, usual-
ly with teams from other delega-
tions.
In Philadelphia, each athlete will
bring a food item and one project
will include sorting and packaging
the donations for a food pantry.
At Jersey Shore, athletes will take
part in "The Many Faces of Our
Community." Activities will include
working with athletes with special
needs and senior adults, as well as
videotaping interviews with war vet-
erans and Holocaust survivors.
Jodi Berris, a Maccabi alumna and
one of Detroit's girls soccer coaches,
feels that community service
enhances the Maccabi experience.
"I definitely think it's necessary
because Maccabi is nut just about
sports. It should encompass other
community and Jewish acitivities as
well."

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