Marissa blogs on our second meeting

This past meeting, October 18, we finalized our mission statement. Before doing so, Miranda gave us each a fake dollar and had us decide what to do with it based on three different scenarios. The first scenario involved an old woman named Sylvia who shakes a can for 24 years asking for change for JNF. The second scenario involved a man named Mike who calls around Rosh Hashana and asks for donations for a college fund he started because his son was killed in the Holocaust. This was a free college loan. The third scenario involved a homeless person who comes up to your face and asks for money. I chose to give my dollar to the free college fund because it really hit home for me. I have to apply to colleges soon, and I would want to be able to pay for college. After this activity, we talked about the differences between charity, gemilut chasadim and tzedakah. We decided that charity is giving money to those in need, gemilut chasadim is kindness to others, and tzedakah is a mixture of the two. Then it was time to decide on our mission statement. We had a lot of trouble deciding what the main focus of our group was going to be, but we finally came to a consensus. The Jewish Youth Tzedakah Foundation is focused on reducing the impact of poverty among Jews.