Year in Review
YACHAD Volunteers Bring Joyful Smiles To Baltimore’s Tudor Heights Residents
By BJLife/Isaac Draiman
Baltimore, MD – Dec. 22, 2015 – Preparation for Shabbos began early this week for the leaders and members of Yachad and the residents at Peregrine’s Landing at Tudor Heights.Yachad, The National Jewish Council for Disabilities is a thriving global organization dedicated to addressing the needs of all Jewish individuals with disabilities and ensuring their inclusion in every aspect of Jewish life.
Under the leadership of Mrs. Rebecca Schrag Mayer, Yachad participants, from Texas to New York, who had been in Maryland for the weekend participating in their first winter leadership shabbaton and volunteer mission, closed out the weekend in style by serving lunch and then braiding and baking challah with the Tudor Height’s residents. “We wanted to make sure our leaders had an amazing experience in Maryland, and this really was the perfect activity for that” said a volunteer.
40 residents and volunteers joined in the newly renovated event room at Tudor Heights and began braiding 25 lbs. of challah dough that was generously donated by Sion’s bakery. Accompanying all this was great energy & singing.
A family member of a resident at Tudor Heights, was amazed at the turn out. “There are always outstanding events and activities here, for both the residents and the outside community. It is just wonderful seeing young people volunteering and you can see the joy on the resident’s faces.” Tudor Heights is coming off of a full week of events during the week of Chanukah beginning with an annual Chanukah party opened to community with over 200 participants.
Other events included the Bais Yaakov Band, Caleb’s Chanukah Show and Torah Institute’s choir. “Our residents love having schools and groups come to perform and visit,” said Executive Director Sherri Zaslow. “When such amazing organization’s such as Yachad and Tudor Heights come together, you know it’s going to be something really special.”
Click here to see all photos!
To view the original article on the Baltimore Jewish Life website, click here.
WATCH: Pizza4Soldiers Event in Israel
My Yachad Shabbaton Experience
By Hannah Kirsch, JKHA Eighth Grader
My first encounter with children from Yachad was one I will never forget. I was quite nervous at first, as was my entire grade of eighth graders attending from JKHA at this past Shabbat’s Junior Yachad Shabbaton at Congregation Ohr Torah in West Orange. At first, we had no idea what to do. But as we started to play ice-breaker games, we all looked around at the Yachad kids and we realized that these kids are just like us. The Shabbaton included children from all over the tri-state area and their ages ranged from about 10 to 18. They definitely know what is going on around them, and once we realized that, the rest was easy and friendships soon formed.
We started chatting with them and having fun. When we were at our group Friday night meal, we talked with them even more. However, it was when we started singing that we made our truest connections. We were all singing loud and proud and having a good time together. No one cared who was who, or where we were from, we just had fun—as kids should. Yachad circle time was an activity that everyone from JKHA loved. We all sat next to each other and sang fun songs, and just swayed with one another.
On Shabbat morning, my housing group was greeted by Hillel, a member of Yachad. We were all talking and laughing. As more groups arrived, they too gathered around him. The more people around him, the happier he seemed to get.
That morning, I befriended a really nice girl. We clicked immediately. She asked me if I would give her my phone number after Shabbat. I said I would love to. She said, “Are you sure because most of the time when I ask for a phone number, they say yes but never really do it.” That hit home for me. I vowed to absolutely give her my phone number which, after Shabbat, I did. I really hope we stay in touch.
I also made friends with another girl. She was very shy, but warmed to me. She sat next to me and asked me to sing ‘The Itsy Bitsy Spider’ to her. Whenever I sang it, she squirmed with delight. At the after-Shabbat ruach we were in a dancing circle together, but she jumped into my arms and only wanted to dance with me. I had trouble saying goodbye to both girls because I had grown to love them so.
At kiddush, no one stopped talking and the fun never stopped. We talked like we were the best of friends, which we were. Kiddush was followed by another circle time in which we sat next to our new friends from Yachad. We sang songs with them and we were not only peers at that point, we were true friends.
The after-Shabbat ruach was my favorite part of all. We blasted wonderful Jewish music throughout the shul and danced our hearts out. I danced with the entire group of girls and some close Kushner and Yachad friends. When we finally went home I only wanted to be back.
Throughout the entire Shabbaton, there was a smile on every person’s face. Whether it was a JKHA member swaying with a Yachad member during circle time or just chatting together, we were always having a great time. The bonding was definitely the most special part. I will never forget the fun times we had and all the friends we made, and hopefully, we will see our friends from Yachad again. The Yachad Shabbaton was one of the best Shabbats of my life.
This article was written by Hannah Kirsch, JKHA Eighth Grader.
To view the original article on Jewish Link of New Jersey, click here.
Yachad’s Continuing Education Conference for Disability Professionals Recap
Yachad’s Continuing Education Conference for Disability Professionals was held on Thursday, November 19, at IVDU Boys School in Brooklyn, coordinated by Michelle Mintz, LCSW, Clinical Director of Jewish Union Foundation.
Forty six professionals comprised of Medicaid Service Coordinators, Supervisors and Social Workers from different agencies across the New York Area were in attendance. Topics Included: Navigating the New OPWDD; Sexuality, Dating, and Marriage; Sensitivity and Person First Language; A panel from IVDU staff focused on ensuring a comprehensive approach for your child/client; Supportive and effective supervision: Q and A; Understanding Psychoeducational Evaluations; and Applied Behavioral Analysis.
The conference was successful, and the attendees enjoyed the sessions, as well as networking throughout the day with colleagues and Yachad staff. The presenters were all staff who are involved in multitude of Yachad programs.
Queens Jewish Link – Community Corner
Yachad Israel Brings Joy (And Pizza) To Army Bases Across Israel
Yachad Israel Brings Joy (and Pizza) to Army Bases Across Israel
Yachad Israel and Magshimmim Chalom pose for a picture while making pizza.
On November 10, members of an Israeli army base came face-to-face with people they were protecting in Israel. And their grateful visitors even brought them pizza.
The visit was organized and planned by Yachad Israel, the Israeli arm of Yachad, the National Jewish Council for Disabilities. Yachad is an agency of the Orthodox Union. Twenty members of Yachad Israel— individuals with special needs— met at Haim’s Pizza in Rishon L’Tzion to bake pizza for IDF soldiers stationed at the Palmachim army base. The pizzas and the transportation were sponsored by donors to Yachad’s Pizza4Soldiers program.
“Everyone in our greater community appreciated and loves the IDF, but showing support isn’t always the easiest thing to do,” said Eli Hagler, associate director of Yachad. “Our Pizza4Soldiers campaign allowed Yachad to give hundreds of people across the world the opportunity to say thank you to soldiers through our program. Creating the pizzas in an inclusive manner and delivering the fresh pies to an army base will help boost moral amongst the soldiers. This will continue to keep their moral high knowing that there are Jews all across the globe who love them, appreciate them and support them.”
Yachad Israel also partnered with Magshimmim Chalom, Realizing Our Dream, an IDF program that integrates individuals with special needs into the Israeli army.
Lisa Galinsky, Program Director of Yachad Israel, explained that the partnership was a natural fit.
A group photo of Yachad Israel members, Magshimmim Chalom and IDF soldiers.
“We always wanted to do something together with the IDF so we decided this Pizza idea might just work,” she explained.
Her intuition was proven right as soon as groups arrived at the pizza store. Jewish music began blasting on the stereo and both Yachad Israel and Magshimmim Chalom members began dancing with each other. If it weren’t for the IDF uniforms, it would have been difficult to tell the participants apart.
Many of the participants of Yachad Israel are native English speakers. Their families either made aliyah or they grew up in English-speaking homes. However most speak Hebrew fluently and sang along with the music.
Though Yachad Israel is relatively new, the program has had an outsized effect on participants.
Meir Malak was born in New York, but made aliyah at the age of eight, 17 years ago. He has been participating in Yachad Israel activities for the last three years and works providing food for people in need.
“I like coming to Yachad Israel activities,” he said. “Even if I have a flight to New York that day I would come and leave early.”
Meir also is part of Yachad Israel’s RBC (Relationship Building Course), a social skills development programs which meets once a week
“The soldiers will be glad,” he predicted.
Once the pizzas were made, participants gathered on a bus provided by Yachad Israel and headed towards the Palmachim army base. As the bus got closer to the base, we could already see the excitement. As we departed from the bus, soldiers began asking questions and talking to the group—and most importantly, given the relatively limited cuisine at army bases, if there would be food.
Yachad Israel and Magshimmim Chalom gave out the pizzas they had made to the soldiers along with personal notes submitted by the pizza’s donors. As the stereo played again, the soldiers danced with the participants.
The Israeli soldiers were delighted with the food, but even more so with the company.
Omer, one of the soldiers serving on the base, explained that he and his unit had just recently arrived on the base.
“Coming to a new place and seeing people who come all the way here just to do this thing for us makes us all very happy,” he said.
Yuval, another soldier at the base, added. “It’s beautiful,” he said. “We are supposed to be the ones giving to our nation, and here our nation is doing all this for us.”
The evening ended with group picture, featuring Yachad Israel, Magshimmim Chalom and the soldiers of the base. As the photographer was getting ready to push the button, one of the soldiers, who was sitting with his friends away from the group, suddenly ran across the yard, guitar in hand. Everyone waited for him to join the group picture because in Yachad, everyone belongs.
“The outpouring of support for the IDF was incredible to see,” said Yoel Sterman, director of Yachad Israel. “When we began this campaign we didn’t know what to expect. Thanks to all of our supporters, we will bring more than 500 pizzas to a number of army bases over the coming months. As a former IDF soldier, I know firsthand how important and meaningful something like this is to the soldiers. Yachad loves Israel, its soldier and the IDF.”
As the photographer snapped the picture, the participants yelled out “We love the IDF” and it seems that the IDF love them all back, very much.
To donate a pizza to an Israeli soldier, click here. To see the full album of photos from the event, click here.
This article was written by the OU Staff.
To view the original article on the Orthodox Union website, click here.
Help Yachad Deliver “Pizza4Soldiers” For IDF
Yachad Israel is showing its support for the Israel Defense Forces and for Israel as a whole with its newly announced “pizza4soldiers” project. In the program, Yachad members, together with their typically developing peers, will be making and delivering pizzas to IDF soldiers.
Yachad, a program of the Orthodox Union, is dedicated to providing unique social, educational and recreational initiatives for individuals with learning, developmental and physical disabilities with the goal of their Inclusion in the total life of the Jewish community. Yachad has an increasing presence is Israel.
Yachad is calling on its North American constituency, as well as Israelis, to support the program by making a $36 donation for each pie. Besides the pie, the donation will provide transportation for Yachad members to and from the establishments in which the pizzas will be baked as well as transportation to and from army bases to deliver the pizzas. Remaining funds will be used for Yachad Israel programming.
Donors will receive notifications and pictures once the pizzas are delivered.
According to Eli Hagler, Associate Director of Yachad, “We are not just making pizzas. We are hosting inclusive events through Yachad Israel at which we will bring Yachad members together with their typically developing peers for fun and engaging pizza-making events. We might do a series of events depending on the final number of pies ordered. After the event, we’ll have a bus and truck/van pick up the pizzas and the people and take them to IDF bases for distribution.”
So far more than 400 pizzas have been sold and a number of events and programs are being planned to deliver them.
“This way,” he said, “we will show how much Yachad values the IDF and its courageous soldiers, and they will take delight in providing a little fun for these heroes while enjoying themselves as well.” To contribute, log on to www.ou.org or yachad.oudev.org.
This article was written by the OU Staff.
To view the original article on the Orthodox Union website, click here.
That’s Life with Miriam L. Wallach – October 29, 2015
October 29, 2015 Episode:
With Eli Hagler, Associate Director of YACHAD and Tobey Karpel, Coordinator of Middlesex County Chapter of Yachad/NJCD on the new Sesame Street character, Julia.
Disabled workers paid just pennies an hour – and it’s legal
One of the nation’s best-known charities is paying disabled workers as little as 22 cents an hour, thanks to a 75-year-old legal loophole that critics say needs to be closed.
Goodwill Industries, a multibillion-dollar company whose executives make six-figure salaries, is among the nonprofit groups permitted to pay thousands of disabled workers far less than minimum wage because of a federal law known as Section 14 (c). Labor Department records show that some Goodwill workers in Pennsylvania earned wages as low as 22, 38 and 41 cents per hour in 2009.
“If they really do pay the CEO of Goodwill three-quarters of a million dollars, they certainly can pay me more than they’re paying,” said Harold Leigland, who is legally blind and hangs clothes at a Goodwill in Great Falls, Montana for less than minimum wage.
“It’s a question of civil rights,” added his wife, Sheila, blind from birth, who quit her job at the same Goodwill store when her already low wage was cut further. “I feel like a second-class citizen. And I hate it.”
Section 14 (c) of the Fair Labor Standards Act, which was passed in 1938, allows employers to obtain special minimum wage certificates from the Department of Labor. The certificates give employers the right to pay disabled workers according to their abilities, with no bottom limit to the wage.
Most, but not all, special wage certificates are held by nonprofit organizations like Goodwill that then set up their own so-called “sheltered workshops” for disabled employees, where employees typically perform manual tasks like hanging clothes.
The non-profit certificate holders can also place employees in outside, for-profit workplaces including restaurants, retail stores, hospitals and even Internal Revenue Service centers. Between the sheltered workshops and the outside businesses, more than 216,000 workers are eligible to earn less than minimum wage because of Section 14 (c), though many end up earning the full federal minimum wage of $7.25.
Harold Leigland, who is blind, with his guide dog on the bus during his morning commute to the Goodwill facility in Great Falls, Montana, where he works hanging clothing.
When a non-profit provides Section 14 (c) workers to an outside business, it sets the salary and pays the wages. For example, the Helen Keller National Center, a New York school for the blind and deaf, has a special wage certificate and has placed students in a Westbury, N.Y., Applebee’s franchise. The employees’ pay ranged from $3.97 per hour to $5.96 per hour in 2010. The franchise told NBC News it has also hired workers at minimum wage from Helen Keller. A spokesperson for Applebee’s declined to comment on Section 14 (c).
Helen Keller also placed several students at a Barnes & Noble bookstore in Manhasset, N.Y., in 2010, where they earned $3.80 and $4.85 an hour. A Barnes & Noble spokeswoman defended the Section 14 (c) program as providing jobs to “people who would otherwise not have [the opportunity to work].”
Most Section 14 (c) workers are employed directly by nonprofits. In 2001, the most recent year for which numbers are available, the GAO estimated that more than 90 percent of Section 14 (c) workers were employed at nonprofit work centers.
Critics of Section 14 (c) have focused much of their ire on the nonprofits, where wages can be just pennies an hour even as some of the groups receive funding from the government. At one workplace in Florida run by a nonprofit, some employees earned one cent per hour in 2011.
“People are profiting from exploiting disabled workers,” said Ari Ne’eman, president of the Autistic Self Advocacy Network. “It is clearly and unquestionably exploitation.”
Defenders of Section 14 (c) say that without it, disabled workers would have few options. A Department of Labor spokesperson said in a statement to NBC News that Section 14 (c) “provides workers with disabilities the opportunity to be given meaningful work and receive an income.”
Terry Farmer, CEO of ACCSES, a trade group that calls itself the “voice of disability service providers,” said scrapping the provision could “force [disabled workers] to stay at home,” enter rehabilitation, “or otherwise engage in unproductive and unsatisfactory activities.”
Harold Leigland, however, said he feels that Goodwill can pay him a low wage because the company knows he has few other places to go. “We are trapped,” he said. “Everybody who works at Goodwill is trapped.”
Leigland, a 66-year-old former massage therapist with a college degree, currently earns $5.46 per hour in Great Falls.
His wages have risen and fallen based on “time studies,” the method nonprofits use to calculate the salaries of Section 14 (c) workers. Staff members use a stopwatch to determine how long it takes a disabled worker to complete a task. That time is compared with how long it would take a person without a disability to do the same task. The nonprofit then uses a formula to calculate a salary, which may be equal to or less than minimum wage. The tests are repeated every six months.
Harold Leigland works at the Goodwill facility in Great Falls, Montana, where he earns $5.46 an hour.
Leigland’s pay has been higher than $5.46, but it has also dropped down to $4.37 per hour, based on the time-study results.
He said he believes Goodwill makes the time studies harder when they want his wage to be lower.
“Sometimes the test is easier than others. It depends on if, as near as I can figure, they want your wage to go up or down. It’s that simple,” he said.
His wife, Sheila, 58, spent four years hanging clothes at the Great Falls Goodwill for about $3.50 an hour. She said the time study was one of the most degrading and stressful parts about her job. “You never know how it’s going to come out. It stressed me out a lot,” she said.
She quit last summer when she returned to work after knee surgery and found that her wage had been lowered to $2.75 per hour, a training rate.
“At $2.75 it would barely cover my cost of getting to work. I wouldn’t make any money,” she said.
Harold said he believes Goodwill can afford to pay him minimum wage, based on the salaries paid to Goodwill executives. While according to the company’s own figures about 4,000 of the 30,000 disabled workers Goodwill employs at 69 franchises are currently paid below minimum wage, salaries for the CEOs of those franchises that hold special minimum wage certificates totaled almost $20 million in 2011.
In 2011 the CEO of Goodwill Industries of Southern California took home $1.1 million in salary and deferred compensation. His counterpart in Portland, Oregon, made more than $500,000. Salaries for CEOs of the roughly 150 Goodwill franchises across America total more than $30 million.
Goodwill International CEO Jim Gibbons, who was awarded $729,000 in salary and deferred compensation in 2011, defended the executive pay.
“These leaders are having a great impact in terms of new solutions, in terms of innovation, and in terms of job creation,” he said.
Gibbons also defended time studies, and the whole Section 14 (c) approach. He said that for many people who make less than minimum wage, the experience of work is more important than the pay.
“It’s typically not about their livelihood. It’s about their fulfillment. It’s about being a part of something. And it’s probably a small part of their overall program,” he said.
Read Goodwill’s full statement
And Goodwill and the organizations that run the sheltered workshops are not alone in their support for Section 14 (c). In many cases, the families of the workers who have severe disabilities say their loved ones enjoy the work experience, enjoy getting a paycheck, and the amount is of no consequence.
Sheila Leigland, who is blind, with her guide dog. She quit her job at Goodwill in Great Falls, Montana, after her hourly wage was lowered to $2.75.
“I feel really good about it. I don’t have to worry so much about him,” said Fran Davidson, whose son Jeremy has worked at Goodwill in Great Falls, Montana, for more than a decade. “I know he’s not getting picked on, and he’s in a safe place. He enjoys what he’s doing, and he’s happy, and that’s what we like for our kids.” Jeremy started out working for a sub-minimum wage but did well on his last time study and is currently earning $7.80 an hour, Montana’s minimum wage.
But foes of Section 14 (c) have hopes for a new bill that’s now before Congress that would repeal Section 14 (c) and make sub-minimum wages illegal across the board.
“Meaningful work deserves fair pay,” the sponsor of the bill, Rep. Gregg Harper, R.-Miss., told NBC News. “This dated provision unjustly prohibits workers with disabilities from reaching their full potential.”
The bill is opposed by trade associations for the employers of the disabled, and past attempts to change the law have failed. But Marc Maurer, president of the National Federation of the Blind and a foe of the sheltered workshop system, is cautiously optimistic that this time the bill will pass, and end what he called a “two-tiered system.”
That system, explained Maurer, says “‘Americans who have disabilities aren’t as valuable as other people,’ and that’s wrong. These folks have value. We should recognize that value.”
Monica Alba contributed to this report.
To view the original article on NBC News, click here.