Since 2009, a growing number of Jewish communities have marked February as Jewish Disability Awareness, Acceptance, and Inclusion Month (JDAIM). This coming year, Thriving Communities would like to celebrate how YOU have adapted your communities to make them more accessible to and inclusive of those of us with disabilities.
How do we want to celebrate? By sharing photos, videos, stories, signs, sermons, and other content about your communities’ adaptations in an online JDAIM campaign throughout February 2024. Adaptations may include physical changes in your spaces, new uses of virtual technology, and/or shifts in communal culture and language. We’re happy to share both completed work and projects still in progress.
Send submissions and questions to Rabbi Asher Sofman, Justice, Equity, Diversity and Inclusion (JEDI) Program Coordinator.
Selected communities will receive:
- Social media shoutouts. Let us show off your accomplishments and raise awareness across the movement!
- A free set of signs, both mailed and emailed, explaining the adaptations you’ve made and how they align with Reconstructionist and Jewish values. (*If you already have signs of your own, send us a picture or video and allow us to lift them up!)
Here’s how you can help us make our JDAIM campaign a success:
- If you have pictures, videos (with a maximum length of 60 seconds), audio, or text you’d like us to spotlight, email us!
- Connect us with the leaders of your disability/inclusion committees or others in your communities doing disability justice work. You can forward this email to them or put them in touch with us directly.
- If your rabbis, clergy, and/or lay leaders have given JDAIM- or disability justice-focused sermons, ask if they’d be willing to share the text or a video for us to add to our offerings.
- The due date to submit materials for our consideration is Friday, January 5th!
