ALEPH to receive $47,000 award to support safety, respect, and equity in Jewish work places & congregational communities

We are excited to share that ALEPH: Alliance for Jewish Renewal has received a grant from SRE Network (Safety, Respect, Equity). This competitive grants cycle provides grantees with access to funding and expert-practitioners in order to enable them to build on their existing efforts to prevent harassment and discrimination and support safe, respectful and equitable workplaces and communal spaces. By being a SRE Network grantee, we are committing to investing our own staff time to advance our work to create safer, more respectful, and equitable workplaces and communal spaces. 

ALEPH will receive a $47,000 award over the course of 2023 & 2024 to launch an equity training initiative for ALEPH Ordination Program (AOP) faculty and ALEPH Network & Affiliated communities. This funding will empower ALEPH to contract with experts in workplace equity and ethics to support the growth of the AOP and our constellation of member communities.

This initiative will kick off in June 2023 with core training from Ta’amod. These trainings will apply frameworks of Jewish wisdom and accountability to help participating communities foster healthy, safe, and equitable communal spaces. Training participants will build vocabulary and working knowledge of psychological safety, power & identity, unlawful harassment, bystander intervention, and fostering a culture of feedback. 

Following training from Ta’amod, participating communities will have the opportunity to work with Sacred Spaces to collect data about what is and is not currently contributing to a safe, respectful, inclusive, and equitable environment for those that work within or access their communal spaces. Sacred Spaces will work with each participating community to build tailored surveys that will inquire into current congregational values and culture, experiences and perceptions around safety, respect, equity, and inclusion, and how concerns have been handled by the congregation in the past. Sacred Spaces will also help communities interpret their survey results to shape future policies and set priorities for how they wish to grow through a supportive process that will extend into 2024. Participation details will be shared with ALEPH’s Network and Affiliated communities in the coming months.

As a member of SRE Network, ALEPH is thrilled to connect our communities with the technical support needed to continue to grow in alignment with the values of Jewish Renewal. SRE Network is a network of 160 Jewish organizations rooted in a shared commitment to safety, respect, and equity-for all. It inspires meaningful change in workplaces and communal spaces by bringing people together to address gender-based harassment, discrimination, and inequity. You can learn more about SRE and its grant making at: www.srenetwork.org.