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Finding A
Political Voice

Temple Beth El teens learn about advocacy
on L’Taken trip to Washington, D.C.

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TOP: Temple Beth El
teens learned about
political advocacy on
the L’Taken trip.
ABOVE: Temple Beth
El Rabbi Mark Miller,
Ari Richardson, Lily
Mendelson,
Tommy Sherman, Lucy
Sher, Lexi Greenberger,
Abigail Scavone,
Donovan Brown
and Debbie Morosohk,
director of education.

ri Richardson, 16, a junior at Farmington High
School, grew up as an active member at Temple
Beth El in Bloomfield Township and is now
president of its youth group. She didn’t know much
about politics or policy making, but she has a wheel-
chair-bound friend at high school that she knows has
some difficulty navigating the building, even though the
school has worked to increase
its adherence to the Americans
with Disabilities Act guidelines
for accessibilities.
“I watch my friend navigate
the school in her wheelchair,”
said Richardson, who after a
recent political advocacy trip
to Washington is now well-
versed on ADA Education and
Reform Act (H.R. 620), a bill
that opponents say will weaken
accessibility rights for the dis-
abled if passed into law.
“It is challenging enough as
it is, and I could not imagine if
she had to do this if there were
no ramps or if doorways were
too narrow to go through. She
and other disabled students
have the right to go through
school doors to get the educa-
tion they need.’”
Richardson and about a dozen of her TBE peers
learned how to lobby for the rights of the disabled as
well as other political issues in Washington, D.C., March
16-19 during the religious school’s first trip with L’Taken
(Hebrew for “to repair”).
In partnership with the Religious Action Center
of Reform Judaism (RAC), the Bernard and Audre
Rapoport L’Taken Social Justice Seminar gathers 200
teens in the Reform Judaism movement from around
the country, exposes and educates them to a variety of
public policy issues within a Jewish values framework,
and then teaches them how to advocate their positions
on upcoming legislation through meetings with deci-

continued on page 28

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April 5 • 2018

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