The Jewish Federation of Greater Washington

Our Plan for Communal Vibrancy defines three key priorities as the driving force behind our work for the coming two to four years:
• Meeting Individual & Family Needs
• Ensuring the Success and Resilience of Jewish Communal Organizations
• Deepening Jewish Learning & Journeys

At the same time, caring for and strengthening our Jewish community remains at the core of Federation’s work. By leading with our values, we are committed to spearheading the essential social changes needed to make our community more vibrant and inclusive — locally, in Israel, and around the world.

Meeting Individual & Family Needs
COVID-19 exacerbated challenges for community members who faced adversity even before the pandemic. Today, even as we enter a post-pandemic world, we are seeing unprecedented levels of financial and food insecurity, mental health needs, and employment training and placement needs. Seeing the growing needs of our community these three years has revealed the need for a long-term strategy to address poverty in the Greater Washington community. Our new, integrated initiative to assist Individuals and Families in Need is focused on food insecurity, housing/financial insecurity, job training and placement, and mental health and domestic abuse. In tackling these four areas, we expect to address the major stressors that present barriers to an individual’s and family’s ability to support themselves.

Ensuring Success and Resilience of Jewish Communal Organizations and Deepening Jewish Learning & Journeys
Strong community organizations are vital to building a vibrant Jewish future in Greater Washington. The essential, identity-building programs and experiences our local institutions provide are irreplaceable. At the same time, Jewish communal experiences are critical to cultivating and strengthening Jewish identity. We are ensuring that the rich diversity of Jewish opportunities in Greater Washington continue to be accessible to and meet the needs of our community for years to come.

Federation’s role as a central convener of Jewish Greater Washington has enabled us to take an overarching approach to meet cross-communal needs.

In addition to the millions we allocate annually to our partners, Federation regularly convenes local organizations to listen and collaborate on shared issues. One such conversation led to a particularly meaningful vaccine initiative partnership between Edlavitch DCJCC and Hillel at The George Washington University, now also
funded by Federation.

Through a significant investment in scholarships and financial aid, we are addressing pandemic-induced
financial barriers to Jewish life and working to increase participation in early childhood education, day
schools, and summer camps. In helping more families opt into Jewish experiences for their children, we
are also investing in the future leadership of our community.

Our partnerships across the Jewish community are crucial to Federation’s work to identify and
address the needs of our Jewish community.

In 2021-22, we allocated over $29 million through Federation and the Jewish Community Foundation to support programs and services locally and around the world, including - $4.6 million to help individuals and families, $9 million to support Vibrant Jewish Life initiatives to strengthen and sustain a flourishing Jewish community, and millions more to support Israel and overseas initiatives, emergencies, and crises.

• Federation supports 57 local agencies across DC, MD, and Northern VA, and is the largest single donor to more than half of these organizations.
• We continue to foster deep relationships with more than 60 congregations across the region and across denominations.
• Beyond Greater Washington, we partner with 14 national organizations and 15 Israel and overseas partners and programs, with an additional 21 grantees in Israel in 2022.

As we work to meet individual & family needs by bringing together JSSA and our network of local human service agencies, Federation led the development of and fully funds 703-J-CARING: the Jewish Community Support Line. Launched in the summer of 2020, the support line has already connected more than 1,200 callers from across DC, MD, and Northern VA with resources available across the region. The program continues to expand in 2022 to meet the evolving and emerging needs of community members.

Additionally:
- Over $1 million in scholarships and financial aid is helping families attending day camps, and overnight camps,
and deepening the grant pool for Federation’s One Happy Camper program supporting over 2,000 children.
- $2.5 million raised and allocated emergency funding is supporting those in need as a result of the war in Ukraine.
- 1,500 people across 91 DC, MD, and Northern VA zip codes accessed emergency assistance.
- Delivered over $1 million in security services through our partnership with Security Community Network, which included 28 facility assessments and 115 training courses with over 4,000 attendees.
- Raised and allocated over $730,000 to assist Afghan resettlement efforts throughout the region.

Learn more at shalomdc.org/impact.