Project Rayut... a resounding success!
by
February 27, 1995

This week, 37 juniors at Yeshiva University’s Central High School are not in class.  In fact, they’re not even in New York.  They’re in Israel, participating in Project Rayut, a student-led chesed mission designed to strengthen relationships between trip participants and students at their partner school in Jerusalem.

The trip is particularly exciting for the 12 students who have never before been to Israel.

Activities during the week-long trip range from the serious-- visiting soldiers at border checkpoints, discussing terrorism—to the lighthearted: painting toys for Ethiopian infants and making balloon animals at a children’s hospital.   

Of course, students will also spend time seeing the sights and bonding with their new friends. 

To compliment Project Rayut, the rest of Central High School is participating in a chesed week at home in New York, making birthday cards for sick children, working at a soup kitchen and hosting a clothing drive, among other activities. 

Project Rayut is the brainchild of Central High School students Joyce Tessel and Yael Ausubel.  In March 2004, the then-sophomores attended the Eimatai Yeshiva High School Leadership Conference, where they met almost 70 youth leaders from across the country.  The conference, part of a biannual series sponsored by the Center for the Jewish Future, focused on how Jewish youth can make change in the world. 

Presenters explained a range of challenging issues, both within the Jewish community and in the world at large; participants chose a problem they wanted to tackle and developed plans to help solve it. 

 “The conference is a way for the most passionate and motivated students to form their own opinions about the big issues and decide what they, as community leaders, can do to make a difference,” said Judy Goldgrab, Director of the Eimatai Yeshiva High School Leadership Project. 

At the conference, Ausubel and Tessel decided they wanted to strengthen the relationships between Israeli and American Jews.  At first, they weren’t sure how to go about it.  Then “One of us suggested organizing a trip to Israel,” recalls Tessel—“And we both burst out laughing,” because it seemed so audacious.

But Eimatai leaders encouraged them to pursue the idea, and the two were soon meeting with Central’s principals to discuss the possibility of a trip.  Eventually they invited their entire class on a solidarity mission to Israel. 

“The support from Eimatai, the CJF, and our high school has been amazing,” Tessel said.

Undergraduate and graduate students, working through the Center for the Jewish Future, served as mentors for the group, helping them make contacts with schools in Israel and plan activities and logistics. 

The Center for the Jewish Future generously supported the trip, and Tessel and Ausubel asked their classmates to generate ideas for grassroots fundraising. 

They devised an array of tactics, from soliciting businesses to selling a school cookbook to hosting an e-bay drive, in which people donated items for the students to sell through the online auction site.

Students also had to prepare for the relationship-building aspect of the trip.  Each Central student was paired with one from the Emunah Torah and Arts High School, and the students started to form relationships with their counterparts well before the trip, exchanging letters and collages about themselves. 

The relationships will continue after the trip as well, with the help of modern technology: Students will continue to communicate via e-mail, and hope to use Internet video conferencing to hold joint classes.  

“I can’t wait to see the looks on the girls’ faces once we’re actually in Israel—especially the ones who have never been there before,” Tessel said before she departed.  

“Yael and I hope that the girls in our grade will gain a new love and appreciation for Israel after forming these special bonds with the girls there.”

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