02-9900125
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Tamuz is an urban kibbutz

Today, in the year 2006 there are 3,000 people participating in Kehilla programs, half of them on a weekly or daily basis.

Nivheret 

"Nivheret" (a Hebrew acronym for "Youth Building a Better Society") is a leadership program for youth who are dedicated to Jewish Continuity in two dimensions – Jewish Pluralism and Social Responsibility.

The program consists of students aged 14 – 17 years old. They meet once a week on their school campus with teachers trained by Kehilla.

500 students participate in the program annually through 25 schools.

Nivheret deals with experiential learning through workshops on questions of equality, social justice, society, and economics and Jewish-Israeli identity.

Students from both religious and secular schools participate in Nivheret. A central component of the education program is to create a meaningful dialogue between the religious and non-religious groups. Through this dialogue we express the values of Jewish Pluralism and mutual respect.

The goal of Nivheret programs is to create a cadre of youngsters who are dedicated to social change in Israel in the fields of pluralism and social justice.

Community Beit Midrash 

The Community Beit Midrash was established in 1997.

The Beit Midrash's goal is to develop new models for community living and Jewish culture in Beit Shemesh and the vicinity. It is a place for Torah study, a continuing education center for teachers and an institution geared to influencing and actively participating in the local community.

The Beit Midrash has a few programs:

Pre-school 

.Forty five children age 1-3 particupate in the program

One third of them are children from families who immigrated from Ethiopia to Israel in the last 5 years

Educational principles

We consider the main principle of educational work to be the interaction between the children and the educators as well as the interaction between the children themselves, with the help of the educators.

To put the above in practice, we adhere to a strict ratio of children to educators.

We believe the job of the educators is to enable the children to encounter different experiences and to serve as an intermediary for each child during the learning process. These experiences include working with different materials, activities, a daily excursion and games in the yard.

Another guiding principle is that children do not learn a concept or a skill in one day. Learning is a long process of interacting with a concept at different times, which enables the child to learn and to build on the concept. In order to support a child's learning, it is necessary torepeat the same activity over and over again. An example of this is when we bake challah for Shabbat or work with the same material once a week, we provide the basis for the vocabulary, concepts and skills connected to that activity.

Integration of Ethiopian children in the preschool 

Within Beit Shemesh there are approximately families who have arrived in the last five years from Ethiopia. From these families, there are approximately 60 pre-school age children aged 1 – 3.

The Ethiopian community in Beit Shemesh live in a concentrated area and tend to send their children to the Early Childhood centers that usually consist of only Ethiopian children. This produces difficulties in acquiring the Hebrew language and integration into Israeli society.

We believe that Ethiopian children could be educated in an integrated culturally- pluralistic framework. This framework should not demand from the new immigrants to forego their culture and language for the sake of Israeli culture and the Hebrew language.

Our Objectives

Citizen's Rights Center

The Citizen's Rights Center was opened in the year 2000. It is located in downtown Beit Shemesh.

The main goal of the center is to create a strong, organized community of citizens who are dedicated to Beit Shemesh. There are two ways in which to achieve this goal.

A lawyer who is assisted by volunteers supervises the center. The volunteers are residents of Beit Shemesh and surrounding Kibbutzim and Moshavim. They are active in advising clients, organizing discussion groups, and developing new programs. In addition, the center has professionals who volunteer in their area of expertise and provide legal advice where necessary.

The Center is open four mornings and one afternoon per week.

Daycare program for Children at Risk

The daycare program is an educational framework that works within the community after school hours, five days a week.

The program provides support and serves as a partial family replacement for children who come from malfunctioning families. We assist children who are dealing with emotional problems and behavioral issues. The program provides the children with favorable conditions in the afternoon without cutting them off from their homes. The program is special in the care it gives children in full cooperation with the parents and in conjunction with social, care, and educational factors.

Target population:

 
Community Bridges

The program aims to form a dialogue between Israeli youth in their post high-school, pre-army year from both religious and non-religious sectors of society. The one year program includes joint study sessions one day a week combined with community volunteer work for the remainder of the week in educational and community programs such as teaching Jewish heritage and rituals in elementary schools. Subjects studied are based on leadership, Jewish identity, Jewish pluralism and teamwork as a base for development in the group views on issues of Israeli society, religious diversity and tolerance. The program emphasizes the value of learning and teaching pluralistic Judaism as a way of developing mutual cooperation. It influences change in the wider community by educating the youth prior to army service so as to create a cadre of young Jewish activists of social tolerance and diversity.

In the 2004-2005 school year 25 youngsters participate in the Study sessions, 12 of them volunteer in Beit Shemesh. Those 12 volunteers work with 200 children on a weekly basis.

Childrens library – Hebrew and Amharic
In order to cope with the cultural differences between western culture and Ethiopian culture, we place a special emphasis on the use of technology and literacy development. As an example, we use photography for documentation of the activities of the children. With the aid of the pictures the children learn to recall their previous experiences. The photos are also used as a communication tool with their parents.Literacy development is achieved by exposing the children to different kinds of books; picture books, children's books, art books etc..With the generous support of Ms. Rhoda Mancher from the Jewish federation ogf Greater Washington we built a library of 50 books, translated from Hebrew to Amharic.In the books the Amharic translation appears below the Hebrew text. Each page is re-covered in a plastic film once the translation is added. As there is a difficulty with some of the parents to read Hebrew, each book is accompanied by an audio-recording in order for the children to listen to the book together with their parent.The books are read to the children by the staff, and they are also able to look at them independently. In addition, the books are available to the families to borrow free of charge.

Friends of Kehilla

We are proud of what we do. With your help we can do more.

We are thankful to 38 Friends in North America who made a long term commitment to support Kehilla and joined "Friends of Kehilla" during the last year.

Prof. Nathan Cogan 
Chairman of Advisory Board for Friends of Kehilla in the USA
PO Box 1732
Portland OR 97207

Partners and supporters

Contact us

Kehilla Office
Tel. : 972-2-9900125
Fax : 972-2-9900100
E-mail : kehilla@tamuz.org.il
Kibbutz Tamuz,
3 Yehuda Ha'Makabi St.
Beit Shemesh
99025

Contacts
President – Osnat El-Natan

General Manager – Yair Alberton – Mobile phone : 972-52-376-8112

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