Based on research conducted for the National Ramah Commission by Professor Steven M. Cohen of Hebrew Union CollegeJewish Institute of Religion and the Berman Jewish Policy Archive at Stanford University. This study was supported by generous funding from Eileen and Jerry Lieberman.
Read More
For as long as I can remember, Camp Ramah has been a central part of my life. In fact, I vividly remember standing in the kitchen with my mom when I was eight years old trying to figure out my plans for the upcoming summer. My mom told me it would be wonderful if I chose a Jewish camp. With friends at Tamarack and my older siblings at Ramah, the decision seemed almost impossible to make. But I did ultimately decide to go to Camp Ramah in Canada.
Read More
For many former campers, summer camp is not just a place to ride horses, race canoes and tie-dye T-shirts. It’s a place to meet people who become their family.
Read More
The level of Jewish engagement and support for Israel on college campuses can be significantly strengthened by leveraging the incredibly positive Jewish experiences of the thousands of undergrads who spend their summers at Jewish camps. It is absolutely time for camp and campus leaders to work more closely together to harness this leadership potential to increase Jewish engagement and positive identification with Israel.
Read More
When Gabe Scott-Dicker, 30, lost his mother last year, he found him-self wondering where he was going to say Kaddish.Like most in his generation, he does not belong to a synagogue. Raised in West Caldwell, New Jersey, and now living in Manhattan, he visited many and felt welcomed by all. But none of them felt quite right. “What I really wanted was that feeling you get at camp,” he realized. “I wanted that Friday night Camp Ramah experience again.”
Read More
NEW YORK – For Srully Stein, Tisha B’Av is about more than commemorating the destruction of the First and Second Temples: It represents the loss he faced after he decided to leave the ultra-Orthodox community he was born into.Hailing from a rabbinical dynasty, Stein, 23, grew up in an ultra-Orthodox family in Williamsburg, New York. At age 18 he met his wife for just a few moments before they were engaged. They had a son, but he dreamt of college and the world outside his insular community. After struggling with conflicting feelings, Stein left the insular community and divorced his wife.
Read More
Jewish outreach on college campuses and through synagogues has, over the past two decades, become the norm. We are no longer surprised to hear that freshmen who never self-identified as Jews were invited to a Shabbat dinner on campus, or that synagogues are revamping their schools to accommodate competition from soccer practice and the plethora of activities many families choose over their children’s Jewish education.
Read More
The first-ever partnership between JDate and a Jewish camping movement has launched. A project of the Reshet Ramah alumni and community engagement initiative, RamahDate will offer former Ramah campers and staff members the opportunity to connect online with other Ramah alumni 18 years of age and older who share the passion for vibrant Jewish life that characterizes the Camp Ramah experience.
Read More
Laugh all you want at the recent rise of "adult summer camps," with their booze-soaked mess halls and raucous grown-up dodgeball games. If the trend indicates anything, it's this: There's something special about camp that you never want to give up.That lifelong devotion and (let's just say it) obsession with summer camp is behind the latest online dating venture. On Friday, prominent Jewish online dating site JDate announced the launch of RamahDate, a partnership with Camp Ramah to create the first camp-specific online dating network of its kind. The tagline? "Find your future bunkmate."
Read More