Mahloket Matters Immersive Summer Fellowship for Hillel Professionals

Pardes North America invites Hillel professionals of all Jewish learning backgrounds to apply for the NEW Immersive Summer Fellowship in Jerusalem, July 10-28, 2022, with a focus on Mahloket Matters: Healing our Broken Discourse.

The Fellowship is a cohort-based learning experience within the larger Pardes Summer Program. Fellows immerse in Jewish text study, touring and building community alongside our dynamic, intergenerational and international Summer Program student body, while also coming together multiple times a week as a smaller affinity group to study and workshop Jewish ideas and texts on the theme of navigating conflict constructively.

The Fellowship is open to Hillel professionals in programming and education roles returning to North American campuses. Fellows commit to translating their personal summer study in Jerusalem into meaningful learning experiences designed to support their campus communities around contentious issues, with Jewish wisdom and text as an anchor.

Fellowships include:

  • $790 subsidy to fully cover Pardes Summer Program Tuition
  • $1000 grant towards travel / housing expenses
  • $500 engagement grant for Mahloket Matters programming upon return to campus
  • Personal mentorship from the Pardes Israel and Pardes North America educational teams (summer + year)

Applicants must fill out both the:

ABOUT THE FELLOWSHIP

We live in a moment of unprecedented breakdown in civil discourse. Yet, our Jewish tradition upholds the principle that constructive disagreement for the sake of heaven (Mahloket L’Shem Shamayim), is not only imperative but the holy work needed to repair what can feel like irreconcilable differences that permeate our Jewish communities. Guided by the belief that Jewish texts and their diverse interpretations can empower us to engage more constructively in disagreements today, Pardes North America (PNA) continues to build upon the impact of our existing Mahloket Matters Fellowship cohorts by launching a NEW summer immersive option for Hillel professionals.

The Fellowship will consist of three essential components:

  1. Immersive text-study and skill-building – Fellows will spend three weeks (S-Th) engaged in rigorous study of classical and contemporary Jewish texts, from Talmud to Bible to Hasidut, with an eye towards contemporary relevance. The intergenerational, multi-voiced Pardes Summer Program community becomes a living lab for exploring differences of perspective, opinion and interpretation, and the larger landscape of Jerusalem and Israel provide rich and challenging case studies around approaches to controversial issues and conversations. Summer participants tour with and hear from guest speakers who help deepen their understanding of complex realities.
  2. Cohort Learning and Individual Mentorship – In addition to learning within the larger Summer Program community, Fellows will meet daily as a cohort of Hillel Professionals for a course exploring the core texts and approaches of Pardes’s renowned Mahloket Matters: Healing our Broken Discourse curriculum. In addition, they will receive individual mentorship to help them shape their visions for adapting the materials to their own campus communities and teaching/facilitation styles and capacities.
  3. Communal Action – As part of their participation in the fellowship, Fellows will be asked to transpose the inspiration and learning into a campus engagement initiative (in a way that balances local creativity and a handful of globally established metrics) for their campuses back home. Each Fellow will receive a $500 campus engagement fund to support the development of their own communal MM study groups and/or community engagement initiatives inspired by MM learning. Click here for the requirements.

By participating in the Mahloket Matters Immersive Summer Fellowship: Healing our Broken Discourse, Hillel Professionals will:

  • Receive both professional mentorship and financial support
  • Deepen their Jewish literacy, textual confidence and facilitation skills
  • Immerse in highly relevant Pardes Torah they can then use to serve their own Jewish communities back home
  • Become a critical voice in a movement to help foster respectful dialogue across North America
  • Join a strong network of colleagues

QUESTIONS? CONTACT AMIRA@PARDES.ORG.