Building Bonds

Initiative improved attitudes, strengthened relationships.

Research that benchmarked

and tracked attitudes and

perceptions held by members

of the Chaldean and Jewish

communities toward each

other shows the Building

Community Initiative

strengthened many of their

already positive opinions

and increased their desire for

additional interaction.

Conducted by the University of
Michigan-Dearborn College of Business,
the research was designed to look at how
members of the two communities view
each other, and how those views may
have changed as a result of the series of
articles appearing in the Chaldean News
and the Jewish News and events associ-
ated with the initiative.
According to Timothy Davis, the
director of iLabs at the UM-Dearborn's
Center for Innovation Research and the
study's principal investigator, bench-
mark research with Chaldean News and

Jewish News readers at the outset of the
initiative in April of 2010 revealed that
most are already accepting of, and com-
fortable interacting and doing business
with, the other community.
"The results showed that a strong
foundation already existed across the
two communities:' Davis said. "Three-
quarters of all respondents said that the
values in their community are similar to
the values of the other community.
"Yet these responses also showed
opportunities to improve relations. Only
half of the people surveyed felt the other
community was welcoming to them,
that they had close friends in the other
community and that they would be
accepting of someone from the other
community who married into their fam-
ily,' Davis added.

coming Together

Between April and December of 2010,
the Chaldean News and the Jewish News
presented their readers with an average
of four full pages per month of near-
identical stories, profiles, timelines,
photos and other information intended
to show similarities between the com-
munities, including a shared vision for
participating in the strengthening of
the economic climate in Detroit and
Southeastern Michigan. During this
timeframe, secular news media outlets,
including the Detroit News, the Detroit
Free Press, Time magazine, WWJ 950

-

and WDET 101.9 radio outlets and
the Metromode digital magazine, also
reported on the initiative.
Interspersed with the monthly content
in the Chaldean News and the Jewish
News were a series of events designed
to maximize one-to-one interactions
between the communities. These includ-
ed an opening event at Shenandoah
Country Club in West Bloomfield, a
young entrepreneurs forum at Wayne
State University's Tech Town in Detroit,
a major networking event at Bank of
America's Troy headquarters, a teen
forum hosted by Bloomfield Hills
Schools, a physician gathering hosted
by Detroit Medical Center and a 2010
wrap-up networking event at Lawrence
Technological University, Southfield.
Following the last Lawrence Tech
gathering, UM-Dearborn researchers
surveyed those who attended any or
all these events and asked them many
of the same benchmarking questions
from April. According to Davis, their
responses were 7 to 13 percentage
points higher than those initially
polled.
"People who attended a Building
Community Initiative event were 20
percent more likely than the initial
respondents to say that the other com-
munity was welcoming of members of
their community," Davis said. "Event
attendees were more likely to say they
have close friends in the other corn-

munity — 10 percent more than the
initial readers polled.
"The only statement where event
attendees responded similarly to the
initial respondents was in regard to
being accepting of someone from the
other community who married into
their family:' he added.
The UM-Dearborn researchers
asked event attendees about the
impact of the Building Community
Initiative. According to Davis, 75 per-
cent from both communities agreed
that the events helped them gain a
better understanding of the other
community and have a more positive
view of the other community, too.

Where Now?

"As for the future of these two com-
munities and further programs like
the Building Community Initiative,
90 percent of event attendees believe
there will now be greater col-
laborations between the Jewish and
Chaldean communities in the future,"
Davis said. "As one attendee explained,
`I think politics and stereotypes sepa-
rate us more than they should; but in
the end, we [the Chaldean and Jewish
communities] are really opposite sides
of the same coin:"
Another respondent said, "I believe
there are still many obstacles and
stereotypes that both sides need to
overcome."
Still another said, "The two com-
munities share a history that goes
back thousands of years. The initiative
should continue for as long as it takes
for the communities to re-establish
their historic relationship" BC

. . . 90 percent of event attendees believe there will now be greater

collaborations between the Jewish and Chaldean communities.

Jewish community activists Don Benyas and Florins Mark with Chaldean
architect Victor Saroki at the May 4, 2010, dinner hosted by the Building
Community Initiative at Shenandoah Country Club, West Bloomfield.

— researcher Timothy Davis

Josh Levine of Huntington Woods converses with Michael Shallal of West
Bloomfield at the June 16, 2010, Building Community Initiative panel at Tech
Town on the Wayne State University campus in Detroit.