Class Descriptions

Advanced Proseminar in Jewish Communal Leadership

SW695

Course Description

The professional seminar in Jewish communal leadership serves as the academic home for the Jewish Communal Leadership Program (JCLP). It provides a critical space in the JCLP curriculum for students to integrate different approaches to knowledge, skills and experience -- acquired in their SSW and Judaic studies courses and in their board and field placements -- into a unified and meaningful experience.

Within the seminar, Jewish Communal Leadership students are given opportunities to meet with local, national, and international professional and lay community leaders, to explore the relationship of personal and professional identities, to engage with historic and current approaches to Jewish community challenges, to work collaboratively on soliciting and addressing communal problems gathered from the field, to participate in generating public programming related to Jewish communal issues, to consult with SSW faculty about the application of Social Work approaches to Jewish communal problems, and to gather peer feedback and establish relationships with each other.
The seminar also serves as a setting for considering general societal concerns from the perspective of Jewish communal interests and values, and for bringing the perspectives and skills that are a part of Social Work study and practice to Jewish communal concerns.
Social Work 695 is intended for second- year Jewish Communal Leadership Program students. It provides them with a space to interact with first-year JCLP students and to focus on group projects in response to the needs of relevant Jewish agencies.

Objectives

a. Gain familiarity with the historical antecedents, contemporary organizational structures, and
critical problems defining contemporary Jewish community.
b. Combine appropriate modes of practice, analysis and knowledge drawn from both Social Work
and Judaic Studies to discuss and address communal issues.
c. Connect relevant professional and Judaic studies course work and field placement experiences
with emerging career interests.
d. Establish relationships and interact professionally with lay and professional leaders in Jewish
communal service, relevant sub-fields, and allied occupational settings. Benefit from their
leadership narratives and learn from their approach to communal work and issues.
e. Develop their own voice, self-presentation, and perspectives as emerging professional leaders.
f. Work together to create an open, exciting, and mutually supportive class forum for the discussion
of challenging issues in a safe environment.
g. Frame big questions and present public forums to draw the broader community into significant
conversations about the American Jewish present and future.
h. Begin to bring their voices to bear on the broader discourse of concerns and debates animating
today’s American Jewish community.