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January 6, 2009
Her stint as a teen volunteer for Panim: The Institute for Jewish Leadership and Values increased Mikah Goldman’s pride in her Jewish identity and beliefs; now, she has joined the Panim staff as program associate.
Goldman lived in Red Bank until her November move to Washington, DC, to assume her new position at the organization, which is based in Rockville, Md. She recently organized a four-day Panim conference on service learning, in which a group of Chicago teens came to the nation’s capital to join forces with an organization that provides meals to the seriously ill in the metropolitan area. The conference attendees also met with representatives of a homeless coalition and a day-care center for homeless children.
It was an eye-opening experience for the teens, who learned the importance of treating others with respect, regardless of their life circumstances, Goldman said.
“The kids spoke to many homeless men and women who had one major request — that they be spoken to as real people and shown some measure of dignity,” said Goldman. “They had another message for the kids; they said, ‘Don’t forget us. We’re people, too.’”
Since Panim’s founding in 1988, more than 30,000 Jewish teens from more than 300 community organizations throughout the country have participated in Panim conferences and workshops in and around Washington. The organization’s mission is to educate and empower Jewish youth to live a lifetime of activism, leadership, and service on behalf of the Jewish people and the larger society through the integration of Jewish values, learning, and social responsibility.
As a high school student, Goldman participated in Panim el Panim (Face to Face), a Washington-based, multi-day seminar that brings together high school students from around the country to explore public policy and social activism as well as programs that focused on Judaism, activism, and mitzva work. As a member of Panim’s visiting faculty, she also escorted Monmouth County students to organizational events.
“The Panim programs reinforced my Jewish identity and inspired a commitment to effect positive social change in the world,” Goldman said. “Panim represents the things I believe in and the values I grew up with — tikun olam and tzedaka. I learned to connect activism to Judaism.”
‘Beginning of a journey’
Among the programs that Goldman will oversee this year will be conferences on relationship-building with Jewish agencies in the United States. She will also organize workshops concentrating on topical issues that resonate with Jewish teens, such as the Jewish response to the crisis in Darfur, energy independence, the nuclear future of Iran, and environmental issues.
“These experiences are the beginning of a journey for them,” said Goldman. “They will discuss these issues in workshops and with field experts and then visit their representatives on Capitol Hill, where they’ll learn that their concerns are taken seriously by this country’s highest elected officials.”
The young participants will be encouraged to continue their activism when they return home, by contributing opinion pieces to local media, attending rallies and conferences that focus on their particular areas of interest, lobbying on behalf of their concerns, and maintaining a dialogue with government officials, Goldman said.
“The lessons of the Holocaust taught Jews how important it is to be aware of, and involved in, the political process,” said Goldman, who for the past two years served as assistant to the director of the Holocaust, Genocide, & Human Rights Education Center at Brookdale Community College in Lincroft.
“Involvement takes more energy and effort, and it’s often much harder to do the right thing,” she said. “But apathy can lead to disaster.”
Goldman, who graduated in 2005 from Rutgers University in New Brunswick, where she majored in psychology and philosophy, is continuing a family commitment to Jewish communal service. Her mother, Ann Goldman of Red Bank, is the executive director of the Women’s League for Conservative Judaism in New York City and previously served as director of planning and allocations for the Jewish Federation of Monmouth County.
“I grew up learning that the element of community is inherent in Judaism,” she said. “That’s why Panim’s mission spoke to me and why it still attracts Jewish teens. They need to know what’s happening in the world and why, and what they can do about it.
“As a result, they learn that they can engage and create positive change in a troubled world.”
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