Opinion A MIX OF IDEAS Dry Bones Editorials are posted and archived on JNonline.us. Editorial Sustaining Our Birthright I is one of the great success stories in the imposing pursuit of building Jewish identity among 18- to 26- year-olds, a still-impressionable age group that represents the core of young Jewish leadership worldwide. More than 200,000 young adults from 50 countries have experienced a free 10- day trip to Israel over the past 10 years as part of Taglit-Birthright Israel, a brilliant philanthropic initiative that continues to have a long waiting list because the demand far outstrips the funding. More than $400,000 has been invested this year in trips with demand now beyond the 30,000 participant limit. What has become the No. 1 question is how well the American Jewish community is engaging Birthright participants when they return. New York-based Birthright Israel NEXT was designed to elevate the importance of alumni follow-up. NEXT is committed to helping American Jewry nurture, educate and sustain future generations of young Jews. New chairman Al Levitt says in a nationally distributed commentary, "Young Jewish adults are engaging in Jewish life in record numbers due in large effort to Birthright Israel NEXT. "Tens of thousands, many of whom grew up without a strong Jewish identity and lacking any substantive Jewish educational background, are turning to Birthright Israel NEXT for ways to deepen the connections to Jewish life that they have been inspired to seek because of their trip to the Jewish homeland." His evidence? NEXT's next Shabbat program already has encouraged 4,000 young adults to host dinners and open their homes to serve 60,000 Shabbat meals to their peers; 700 alumni were hosts dur- ing the last Shabbat dinner program in December. Levitt has feedback to show that thousands more have joined in local cultural and educational events. Aggressive alumni tracking certainly gives NEXT better statistics to gauge its appeal. Buoyed by the results, NEXT aims to engage more than 100,000 alumni through an array of post-trip experiences selected to lift Jewish literacy and build connections to the wider Jewish commu- nity. It gives Birthright credit for inspiring tens of thousands of alumni to become immersed in programs hosted by campus Hillels and other campus-based Jewish and Zionist groups. Hundreds more are signing up for Jewish and Israel studies courses to sustain their Jewish journey that started on Birthright. That is well and good, but the scope NATO FORCES ARE STRIKING TALISAN STRONGHOLDS IN AFGHANISTAN. and reach of NEXT only scratches the surface of an alumni base of 215,000 — and counting. Levitt, president of the Jim Joseph Foundation, is right: NEXT can't intensify Birthright follow-up alone. It needs to partner with existing and new organizations that share an interest in inspiring young adults and increasing their communal involvement. NEXT is focusing on four identity-building areas: learning Hebrew, celebrating Shabbat, meaningfully connecting to Israel and to the Jewish people. "We are fully com- mitted to making Birthright follow-up every bit as rich, textured, meaningful, absorbing — and life-changing — as the trip itself;' says Levitt, who seems well- equipped to take to the next level what American mega-philanthropists Michael Steinhardt and Charles Bronfman, the Israeli government, the Jewish Agency for Israel and other investors started with Birthright. To that end, Birthright Israel NEXT HOPES AND PRAYERS THE CAREFULLY PLANNED ATTACK WAS LAUNCHED WITH >n, PRESIDENT OBAMA'S HOPES AND PRAYERS THAT WHEN IT'S OVER www.drybonesblog.com must seek out partners with backbone, like StandWithUs. Such partnerships would push NEXT to become more instru- mental in giving alumni the knowledge, confidence and heart to advocate for Israel in the wake of harder-edged, anti-Israel bias and hostilities on college campuses across the country. EI To learn more about partnership opportunities: next.birthright.com . Reality Check The Roots Of The Game H anging on the wall above my computer is a lithograph of the world champion 1876 Boston Red Stockings. They were the first pen- nant winners in what would grow into the National League, baseball's first profes- sional organization. Some of the names might sound famil- iar if you've ever visited Cooperstown. Albert Goodwill Spalding was the star pitcher, a six-footer at a time when few grew to that height. He left the game a few years later, built a sporting goods compa- ny that landed lucrative contracts with the big leagues and was the wealthiest man the new sport created. Seated in the center is the manager, Harry Wright, regarded as the finest, shrewdest mind in the game. At his feet is his younger brother, George, the game's first five-tool superstar — run, hit, hit with power, throw, field. They had come from Cincinnati to join the new league seven years after the Red Legs brought 26 March 4 • 2010 baseball to national attention by going on a 69-game win streak. Here they are, 144 years later. The bones of Custer's command had been enriching the Montana soil for just four months. It was America's 100th birthday and the sensation at the Philadelphia Centennial Exposition was the telephone. The emperor of Brazil, Dom Pedro, listened to a message from a nearby town and shook his head in sheer amazement. The Republicans and Rutherford B. Hayes would steal this fall's presidential election and leave the South to its Jim Crow fate for the next 70 years. Hundreds of possible Jackie Robinsons and Willie Mays could never appear in a championship lithograph as a result of that. (Not until 1948 did Larry Doby and Satchel Paige make it in.) As a history and baseball buff, I can look at that old pic- ture for an hour and discover something new in it. So long ago, yet so familiar. If I sat in the stands to watch these guys play, I would immediately rec- ognize their game. Its texture is intertwined with that of the growing nation's. This may be hard to believe for those who think baseball history began with ESPN, but the first 40 years of the game were dominated by Boston. The New York teams didn't win a pennant until 1903. The Red Sox mauled the Yankees on a regular basis. Those must have been happy days. Detroit lost its National League team (which was called the Wolverines) in 1889. When they joined a minor league a few years later, a local newsman, not- ing the stripes on their uniform sleeves, named them the Tigers. And so they have remained for 116 seasons. I bring all of this up because its all about to begin again; from the frigid April start to the desperate hopes of September. The player we never heard of now who will end up carrying the weight on his shoul- ders, perhaps, like another Rick Porcello. The game is timeless. I look up to my wall and there are those scrappy old Bostons, ready to outthink you or open a gash in your leg or stick a fastball in your ear. Could they ever have imagined what they had begun? Forty-nine years after this picture was taken, George Wright was invited back to Cincinnati for the first World Series ever played there. The old man must have looked around in wonder. The game had become a national treasure. FT George Cantor's e-mail address is gcantor614c aol.com .