JULY 16 • 2020 | 33
T
his summer a coalition
of Jewish agencies and
foundations will con-
nect Jewish young adults with
service and social and racial
justice volunteer projects
through a campaign called
Serve the Moment. The pro-
gram was created in response
to the call for relief from the
coronavirus pandemic, as
well as the racial injustice
that has long impacted Black
Americans across the country.
Local efforts in Detroit will be
facilitated by Repair the World
Detroit, which is also moving
to its new space at the Durfee
Innovation Society (housed in
the former Durfee Elementary
School building) in July.
Running in Detroit from July
8-Aug. 7, Serve the Moment
was created by the newly
formed Jewish Service Alliance.
The initiative mobilizes tens
of thousands in virtual volun-
teering, in-person service and
national service campaigns
around specific issues during
the year. Jordan Fruchtman,
senior director of the Jewish
Service Alliance, said the pan-
demic caused Repair the World
to suddenly pivot its efforts.
As part of the Jewish Service
Alliance, the organization
received significant funding to
fulfill the newly formed mis-
sion of responding to needs
caused by COVID-19 and
social injustices.
“Repair the World has
created a response that is spe-
cifically tied to the effects of
coronavirus,” said Fruchtman,
who is based in California and
seven years ago helped estab-
lish Detroit’
s Moishe House.
“Everything we are doing in
this program will have an
underlying thread of address-
ing racial injustice. Our Corps
members will serve in four
areas: food insecurity, educa-
tion, employment and mental
health resources.”
Serve is also in partnership
with local Jewish organiza-
tions that include the Jewish
Federation of Metropolitan
Detroit as well as the Charles
and Lynn Schusterman Family
Foundation, the Jim Joseph
Foundation and Maimonides
Fund through the Jewish
Community Response and
Impact Fund.
Sarah Allyn, executive
director of Repair the World
Detroit, said she
is simultaneously
in the process of
filling 10 Corps
positions, hiring
a coordinator to
oversee them and
coordinating with
nonprofit organizations in
Detroit to evaluate and assess
where the need is the greatest.
Allyn said the timing of
Serve’
s launch had a lot to do
with how national and local
agencies needed to take the
time to process how the pan-
demic affected their organiza-
tions, the communities they
serve and the disruptions it
caused in the summer plans of
Jewish young adults.
“In those first few weeks of
the pandemic, we were all on
survival mode,” Allyn said.
“We needed time to evaluate
and assess the availability of
young adults whose original
summer plans (of working as
summer interns, Jewish camp
counselors or traveling to
Israel) were disrupted. Now,
we are actually riding this
bicycle as we build it.”
Allyn said Corps members
will volunteer in a mixture of
in-person and online capacities.
Detroit will hire 10 Corps
members who will serve 32
hours a week, including taking
Friday to participate in Jewish
and social justice learning.
Corps members will receive a
$500 stipend for the program.
Molly Lippitt, 22, of
Bloomfield Hills has been
selected as one
of the first Corps
volunteers to serve
in Detroit. She
recently earned
her master’
s
degree in educa-
tion in Spain and
was planning on teaching there
before the pandemic hit. As the
daughter of Repair the World
board member Robb Lippitt,
she said she is excited to be
following in the footsteps of the
work her father began as well
as carrying out Jewish values
of tikkun olam she learned as
a teen through BBYO and at
Temple Shir Shalom.
“I am very excited to volun-
teer through an organization
that my family has been long
involved with,
” Lippitt said.
“The Jewish values I have
learned urge us to help out the
wider community any way we
can. As Jews, we know histor-
ically what it has been like to
face oppression. I am looking
forward to working as a Corps
member with Repair the World
this summer to work toward
rectifying the systematic racism
that has long existed in our
country.
”
STACY GITTLEMAN CONTRIBUTING WRITER
COURTESY OF JEWISH SERVICE ALLIANCE
Jews in the D
Jews
t e
jews and racial justice
Serve
the Moment
New program connects Jewish young adults with
social and racial justice volunteer projects.
Sarah Allyn
Molly
Lippitt