In Focus

In focus 11.17.17

L-R): Danya Horwitz, Haley Fried, Hilary Kleppel and Belle Soyfer join in the dancing while waiting for dough to rise at the Mega Challah Bake on Oct. 26 at the Tucson Jewish Community Center.

Women and girls flock to Mega Challah Bake

A record 330 women and girls turned out for Tucson’s fourth annual Mega Challah Bake on Thursday, Oct. 26, hosted by Chabad Tucson and the Tucson Jewish Community Center. Feigie Shemtov, program director at Chabad Tucson, led the evening, which included a lesson in mixing, kneading and braiding challah dough as well as education on the spiritual significance of the mitzvah of making and separating challah; a challah and dip buffet prepared by Rebbetzin Chanie Shemtov and Flora Ismailova; and a DJ and dancing.

M’kor Hayim volunteers at the Poz Café Oct. 19, Front row (L-R): Grace Hartman, Barbara Gilbert, Carol Weinstein, Arlan Colton; back row: Bryan Kaplan and Richard Hartman. Not pictured: Rabbi Helen Cohn.

M’kor Hayim volunteers at Poz Cafe

Congregation M’kor Hayim was one of several faith communities that volunteered Thursday, Oct. 19 at Tucson Interfaith HIV/Aids Network’s Poz Café. The café serves a monthly catered meal to those living with HIV, and marked 25,000 meals served at its October event. The congregations supply the food, cooked by the TIHAN chef, and also provide raffle prizes. TIHAN also supplies care bags at the Poz Café with hygiene and cleaning products.

(L-R) Handmaker residents Elaine Mclain and Mort Edberg join students including Sophia Silverman, Jyotie (Jojo) Steinbeck and Ethan Levy in building a “Marshmallow Challenge” tower Nov. 5 at Handmaker.

Teens, Handmaker residents join in community service project

Students from the eighth-grade religious school classes at Congregation Or Chadash, Temple Emanu-El and Congregation Chaverim, who do joint programming as they prepare for a trip to Los Angeles in the spring, visited Handmaker Jewish Services for the Aging on Sunday, Nov. 5 to work on a service project with Handmaker residents.

The morning began with “The Marshmallow Challenge,” as four teams competed to build the tallest tower using a single marshmallow, spaghetti noodles, tape, string, scissors and a popsicle stick. The winning team creating a 38-inch tower. After this ice breaking activity, residents and teens made greeting cards and filled bags with items the teens had donated for the homeless women served by Sister Jose Women’s Center.

Participants at the first JCC Western Regional Conference, outside the Tucson Jewish Community Center Nov. 2.

Tucson J hosts regional conference

The Tucson Jewish Community Center hosted the first JCC Western Regional Conference Nov. 1-2. Representatives of the JCC Association, eight JCCs from Arizona, California and Nevada, plus a JCCA affiliated organization (Shalom Institute) and a non-JCC affiliated organization (Camp Mountain Chai), both in California, attended. The conference included a lecture and workshops with Rick Yngve of the McGuire Center for Entrepreneurship at the University of Arizona; informal conversation workshops led by Unscrewed Theater; and a panel discussion on developing a positive staff culture with Jay Jacobs, CEO of the Valley of the Sun JCC, Shulamit Resendez of Tuft & Needle in Phoenix, and Jeffrey Rips,CEO of Alpert JCC in Long Beach, California.