Racial Equity, Diversity, & Inclusion (REDI) Workshops

Please join us for Beyond Welcoming: Addressing Racism, Homophobia, Ableism, & More. Start building stronger communities and transform the ways in which you can create meaningful Jewish experiences for people of all backgrounds. This workshop is open to all.

Please join us for this 4-part series, where we will start (or continue) the essential work of incorporating REDI practices & principles into our communities. This series will provide you with the opportunity to learn how to create a REDI Working Group. We will focus on utilizing the URJ Congregational (or Camp) Assessment. This workshop is for leaders who are interested in leading/co-leading a REDI working group in their community.

This workshop will help congregations that are engaging in the clergy placement process to better understand how implicit bias unknowingly informs our organizational processes. Participants will also learn how to prioritize equitable recruitment and hiring processes resulting in a more diverse applicant pool and increased equity in our communities. This workshop is a partnership between the URJ, American Conference of Cantors (ACC), & the Central Conference of American Rabbis (CCAR). This training is specifically for members of ACC & CCAR clergy placement committees. In addition, please feel free to also attend if you are a hiring manager or on other hiring committees, as much of the information will still be relevant.

Please join us for Beyond Welcoming: Addressing Racism, Homophobia, Ableism, & More. Start building stronger communities and transform the ways in which you can create meaningful Jewish experiences for people of all backgrounds. This workshop is open to all.

Effective greeters can create a congregational culture of belonging for Jews of all backgrounds who enter your doors, whether they’re members, prospective members, or visitors. Conversely, lack of a greeting, or the wrong kind of greeting, can unintentionally marginalize individuals and families and signal the exact opposite of what we are aiming to communicate. This workshop is open to all; however, this is specifically for congregational/community members/staff that are on congregational/community greeter committees.

This workshop will be interactive and focus on common microaggressions that community members from a wide range of marginalized backgrounds experience. During this workshop, we will learn how to identify a microaggression, common microaggressions in the Jewish community, and strategies to disrupt microaggressions caused by others, as well as those (inevitably) caused by ourselves. This workshop is open to all.

Please join us for this 3-session series, where we will deepen our commitment and our capacity to leverage our positions as white antiracists. This workshop is for White Jewish/Jewish adjacent people (those of us who are not Jewish but are partnered with a Jew, part of a Jewish family, or interested in Judaism) who are looking to build their anti-racism skills and gain an understanding of white dominant culture.

We will learn about some of the ways people from various marginalized backgrounds (including members of the LGBTQ+ community) experience marginalization in our communities. Additionally, we will learn some shared inclusive language as well as tools that will help us disrupt oppressive behaviors and create a community of belonging that we all strive for. This workshop is open for all. We highly encourage congregational leadership, program professionals, and membership/engagement professionals to attend. In addition, those with family members and loved ones who identify as LGBTQ+ may find this workshop very helpful.

The High Holidays are a time when more people than ever are in our buildings and in our Zoom rooms. Come learn how to ensure your High Holiday planning includes affirming community members of all backgrounds and ensuring that all of us are able to experience a community of belonging. This workshop is open to all. We highly encourage congregational leadership, program professionals, and membership/engagement professionals to attend.

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"Gratitude Thursdays" are affinity gatherings modeled after an event called First Fridays (various public events that are planned in cities on the first Friday of the month).  These spaces are designed to allow people who self-identify as Jews of Color and/or People of Color a space for relationship-building, reflection and rejuvenation.  We will have guest speakers from time to time, discuss books/poetry, hangout and even dance a little. *Feel free to pop-in for just a little while or join for the whole time - either way, we'd love to see/meet you!

*We realize People of Color "POC"/Jews of Color "JOC" are not a monolith and that that term isn't always a useful word to describe oneself. We also realize not all POC/JOC identify as People of Color, and that not all POC use that term. That being said, the organizers of this call/ Leaders of Color who are facilitating settled on this language (learn more about race-based affinity spaces).