Avodah: The Jewish Service Corps

Service Corps

2023

$125,000

In the years after Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans, RPF helped Avodah, the Jewish social justice leadership organization, bring its service corps program to the Big Easy. Today, in addition to New Orleans, Avodah has a variety of Jewish justice programs in Chicago, New York City, Kansas City, and Washington, D.C. Their Service Corps program invites roughly 50 young Jews (aged 21-26) to live and learn together while they spend a year working for local organizations addressing poverty and other justice issues. The impact is trifold: partner organizations benefit from having dedicated young Corps Members add significant capacity to their work, participants build meaningful connections to each other and to the communities in which they serve, and the broader Jewish community gains a pipeline of young leaders committed to social justice. With support from RPF, Avodah will continue operating the Jewish Service Corps in its current locations while also studying ways to further deepen the program’s impact over the years ahead.

Photograph courtesy of Avodah