Dear BWC Community,

We are excited to share with the whole BWC community about our Children’s Education Programs (Shule, TASC, and Circle Playtime) Expansion Project! This project was launched last year with an incredible one-to-one matching gift from Lizbeth & George Krupp of $145,000 over three years. We have been hard at work raising the matching funds from within and beyond our community – which are meant to be gifts from new donors to BWC or increased gifts from current donors. 

Shule provides students with a solid ethical foundation and a sense of rootedness in a Jewish heritage that offers models for pursuing justice and building solidarity. Jewish identity and values deepen through communal rituals and structures that provide children and families with a feeling of belonging. It’s about having a connection to each other, as well as to a shared history and shared values.

These funds have enabled us to: 

• Grow our Capacity: We hired Carly Dreme Calbreath as our Recruitment & Retention Coordinator (two-year role), to grow our Children’s Education Programs.
• Strengthen our Curriculum: We launched a curriculum development project, led by current staff, teachers, and parents. The lesson development phase of the project is now being led by a curriculum consultant, Rose Sadler.
• Reach More Students: We have grown from 123 children in our Children’s Education Programs (Shule, TASC, and Circle Playtime) to 138 children this year (reaching our year two goal!), and our goal for next year is to have 165 children across these programs. 

So far, we have raised $127,399 out of our $145,000 goal! We have primarily been focused on raising this match through major donor giving, but we need your help to get to the finish line!

We have also been working with Shule families to raise $30,000 of this match from the broader Shule community. We have made huge progress towards this goal, but in order to reach it, we are looking to our broader community today to help us raise $3,300 in gifts for this year, and $3,300 in pledges for next year. Here is where you can make your pledge*:

Be on the lookout for an upcoming blog post where we will dive into some of the work Carly has done on recruitment and retention and the work of our curriculum development team! 

Thank you so much for your incredible support and commitment to our community and our Children’s Programs! If you have any questions, don’t hesitate to reach out to us by replying to this email!

In gratitude,

Ali Rice, BWC Deputy Director +
Angela Markle, BWC Board Member and Shule parent

*After filling out the pledge form, when you’re ready to make your first year payment on your pledge: Donate online at this link. Under “Is your donation in honor/memory of someone? Other Comments?” write in “Shule Match.” If you prefer to give via a check, please write ‘Shule Match’ in the byline and mail to Boston Workers Circle, 6 Webster Street, Brookline MA 02446.

We would love to share a story of impact from one of our former TASC members, who also attended Shule:

”I’m happy to have been a part of BWC since I was nine. I vividly remember attending Shule classes where we discussed important issues such as misogyny, racism, and antisemitism, and the role we can play in counteracting these forms of hatred. My 3rd grade (Giml) teacher, Pauli Katz, was the first person to plant the seed in my mind that my voice and my thoughts could make real change. When parents were skeptical about Pauli discussing these heavy topics with their kids, she pointed out that we were actually the ones who had brought them up–these issues mattered to us and she wanted to give us a space to discuss them, especially in the landscape of Trump’s 2016 campaign.

“Today, I apply the principles I’ve learned from Shule to my life all the time, at BWC’s Teens Acting for Social Change and also in my outside work as Co-Chair of the Youth Leadership Committee at BAGLY, a nonprofit that offers support systems to LGBTQ+ youth. Self-advocacy, public speaking, and conviction are all skills that I first learned in Shule, through the yearly protests, our exciting class discussions, and the holiday parties and plays.

“When we create spaces where youth feel included, accepted, and empowered, they can go on to pursue amazing things. Shule and TASC at BWC fully provide these spaces and are crucial to Boston’s Jewish community.” – Elle, TASC participant 2024