WJC NextGen 18 Months Report

20212022 18MONTHS OUR FIRST

WJC NextGen is an international community of Jewish youth leaders, empowered through network, resources, and opportunities to create meaningful impact in strengthening global Jewry and fostering our collective future.

250 STUDENTS IN OUR NETWORK

+ +

1000 STUDENTS DIRECTLY IMPACTED

33 COUNTRIES REPRESENTED

5 INITIATIVES

The Lauder Fellowship is an international network of top Jewish student leaders seeking to represent and advocate on behalf of the global Jewish community.

FELLOWS

HIGHLIGHTS ‘21-22

VANINA MEYER

Vanina Meyer worked with ARIEL, the Geneva Union of Jewish Students, where she worked to foster the organization’s sustainability and enhance their partnerships to ensure their inclusion within the Geneva and Swiss Jewish communities. With the help of the WJC Geneva office, she and the staff at ARIEL had the opportunity to meet with the Jewish community in Geneva, where they created a partnership and organized an event at CIG for the first time. Due to this partnership, other Jewish organizations were encouraged to partner with ARIEL, including Association Suisse Israel and Keren Hayessod. As a result, ARIEL is now the reference for all Jewish student leaders in Geneva and is invited to high-level events and asked to participate, moderate, and facilitate sessions.

ABEL HERNANDEZ ESKENAZI

Eskenazi developed a mobile application for the Cuban Jewish community to use as an educational tool for their Sunday school. The app is published on the Cuban Android app store and currently has around 400 downloads, about 4xs the total of Jewish students attending Hebrew school. Abel is currently working on positioning his app to be displayed as the only result associated with the keyword “Jew” on the Cuban Android store. This app is the first of Jewish-related content in Cuba’s app store. Abel published the app on Google Play to share his vision with the world.

MICAH ROSS

DANIEL LAZER AND MELIS YASAT

Launching the Nordic Youth Seminar, Yasat and Lazer brought together young Jews from the Nordic countries to discuss diplomacy, antisemitism, the Middle East, and Jewish life in the Nordics. Daniel and Melis built the seminar around five main pillars: Jewish advocacy, antisemitism, Israel-Palestine/Middle East relations, social media, Judaism, and the Nordic countries. The seminar, which was intended for individuals between 18 and 30 years old, helped create a sense of unity among the Nordic Jewish youth. In addition, the seminar paved the way for future engagement with the World Jewish Congress, as the pair worked closely with WJC Representative in the Nordics and Religious Freedom Task Force Coordinator Petra Kahn Nord on this project.

ADINA SIEFF

Through the Malka Ella Fertility Fund organization, Sieff promoted the importance of genetic testing before entering a relationship. In addition, Adina hosted a webinar with the Fund, featuring a couple who shared their journey after testing positive for a genetic condition.

Ross created the Holocaust Learning Fellowship, a fellowship designed to educate Jewish, Christian, and Muslim students about the Holocaust and dangers of antisemitism and bigotry. Each session lasted about two hours and ran once weekly for five weeks. On International Holocaust Remembrance Day, she hosted a Zoom event with Holocaust survivor Anita Magnus Frank. On Yom HaShoah, she hosted morning and evening events commemorating the Holocaust. Her morning event featured remarks from the Rabbinic leadership of Hillel, Meor, and Chabad, and personal reflections from descendants of Holocaust survivors. At the evening event, Micah created a rock garden at the campus Hillel, where students painted rocks with the names of those who perished in the Holocaust.

COHORTS

2019 – ‘20 2020 – ‘21

Adam Shapiro

Cornell University

Canada

Cami Tussie

Harvard University

United States

Daniel Minden

McGill University

United States

Eliran Oz

New York University

United States

Jake Benyowitz

Yeshiva University

United States

Joseph Marby

University of Texas at Austin

United States

Kayla Ginsberg

University of the Witwatersrand

South Africa

Neil Dasgupta

Stony Brook University

United States

Talia Chasen

Binghamton University

United States

2021 – ‘22

Aidan Golub

Harvard University

United States

Alison Comite

University of Pennsylvania

United States

Ben Spilg

McGill University

Canada

Caterina Cognini

Ca’Forscari University of Venice

Italy

Dan Alpert

University of Maryland

United States

Elizaveta Zaidman

University of Potsdam

(Berlin) Moldova

Elliot Cina

Victoria University

New Zealand

Gaby Davis

Monash University (Clayton)

Australia

Gila Aberman

University of Witwatersrand

South Africa

Levy Agaronnik

Cornell University

United States

Liat Sadovitch

Anáhuac University

Mexico

Lika Torikasvili

Bennington College

Georgia

Matthew Benak

Binghamton University

United States

Rhiannon Chajmovicz

CUNY Baruch College

United States

Samuel Kapner

University of Texas at Austin

United States

Samuel Levy

University of Chicago

United States

Sruli Fruchter

Yeshiva University

United States

Tia Sacks

University of Western Ontario

Canada

Zachary Milewicz

Washington University in St. Louis

United States

Abel Hernandez-Eskenazi

Technological University of Havana

Cuba

Adina Sieff

University of Witwatersrand

South Africa

Ariela Di Gioacchino

University of Bologna

Italy

Benjamin Slotkin

University of Pennsylvania

United States

Chloe Corne

Macquarie University

New Zealand

Chloe Levian

University of California (Los Angeles)

United States

Daniel Lazer

Leiden University

Sweden

Daniella Springer

McGill University

Canada

Elsa Cukierman

University of Chicago

Singapore

Jesse Muller

University of Ottawa

Canada

Maia Bornzstein

Universidad Torcuato Di Tella

Argentina

Máté Zsédely-Holler

University of Amsterdam

Hungary

Meir Hersson-Edery

University of Montreal

Canada

Melis Yasat

King’s College of London

Finland

Micah Ross

Emory University

United States

Nechama Huba

Wellesley University

United States

Olivia Zelling

University of Texas at Austin

United States

Samuel Zahn

University of North Carolina at

Chapel Hill

United States

Shayna Wise-Till

Union of Jewish Students

England

Sofia Schwartzman

Universidad Nacional de Asuncion

Paraguay

Vanina Meyer

The Geneva Graduate Institute

France

2022 – ‘23

Abel Keszler

University of Glasgow

Hungary

Alissa Foster

University of New South Wales

Australia

Ariel Grosman

Buenos Aires University

Argentina

Asher Swidler

Brown University

United States

Avorohom Malachowski

CUNY Baruch College

United States

Blake Zieglar

University of Notre Dame

United States

Brandon Wisnicki

University of Pennsylvania

United States

Eliott Prezerowitz

Georgetown University

United States

Emily Kalo

University of Manitoba

Canada

Emma Hallali

Utrecht University

France

Emma Sameth

George Mason University

United States

Florencia Kaplun

Universidad de Buenos Aires

Argentina

Gabriella Farber

University of Witwatersrand

South Africa

Ghila Lascar

Universita degli Studi di Firenze

Italy

Guy Dabby-Joory

University of Oxford

United Kingdom

Hanna Nir

Uppsala University

Sweden

Hannah Siegel

Southern Methodist University

United States

Joshua Norman

University of Witwatersrand

South Africa

Micaela Vaisembrut

Catholic University of Asuncion

Paraguay

Micah Gritz

Tufts University

United States

Naomi Bennett

Heidelberg University

Germany

Nati Pressmann

Queens University

Canada

Neely Kasanoff

New York University

United States

Noah Katz

Lancaster University

United Kingdom

Rebecca Cantor

California State University

(Long Beach)

United States

Rivka Vittoria Bublil

Luiss University

Italy

Ron Aladjem

University of Manchester

United Kingdom

Tal Hemu

University of Amsterdam

Israel

YEAR 1

FELLOWS COUNTRIES

YEAR 2

20 9

FELLOWS COUNTRIES

YEAR 3

21

13

FELLOWS COUNTRIES

YEAR 4

FELLOWS COUNTRIES

EVENTS

DIPLOMACY SUMMIT

In May 2022, the first three cohorts of the Lauder Fellowship went on the inaugural Diplomacy Summit. 39 Fellows from 20 countries joined the advocacy trip to Brussels and Paris to hear from high-level officials and topic experts. During the four-day summit, the Fellows met with representatives from the European Commission, European Parliament, NATO, UNESCO, OECD, local Jewish communities, and other NGOs.

OPENING SEMINAR

At the beginning of each cohort, the new Lauder Fellows come together for a 3-day comprehensive training seminar at the WJC’s Headquarters in New York. They learn about WJC’s core focus areas at the seminar, network, share ideas, and have exclusive meetings.

In August 2021, due to COVID-19 restrictions, two parallel seminars were held—one in New York and one in Brussels. In August 2022, the new cohort all came together in New York for their Opening Seminar. Highlighted sessions include Special Briefings from the Israel Defense Forces, Holocaust

& Antisemitism Analysis by Dr. Rob Williams (Deputy Director of the US Holocaust Memorial Museum), Student Activist Training by Adela Cojab, special visits to the UN Outreach Programme and a session with its director Tracey Peterson, and meeting with World Jewish Congress topic experts.

FELLOWS AT OTHER CONFERENCES

WJC Executive Committee Meeting, Prague, 05.2022

World Higher Education Conference, UNESCO, 05.2022

Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) Youth Forum, 04.2021 and ‘22

UN Transforming Education Summit, 09.2022

Third Moscow International Conference, “Protecting the Future” by Russian Jewish Congress, 11.2021

NextGenInc., a first-of-its-kind project of the World Jewish Congress and World Union of Jewish Students, is a start-up style incubator, designed to give young Jewish leaders with innovative ideas access to resources and mentorship to transform their idea into a sustainable reality.

THE PROJECTS

FEJJE

Federación de Jóvenes Judíos en España (FEJJE) is the official representative of the young Jews in Spain.

HAVURAH ART

Havurah is a collective of young Jewish artists, writers, poets, musicians, filmmakers, photographers, and creative souls in New York City. Havurah believes art is a mechanism for engaging with the divine and, consequently, is crucial to spiritual practice. At Havurah, one meets “at the corner of poet and prophet.” Havurah hosts monthly events in NYC and has its journal, “Verklempt!”

JEWNITY.APP

Jewnity.app is an application sharing Jewish cultural events and locations throughout Amsterdam.

JEWISH ORIGINAL MEDIA

Led by co-founders Meyer Grunberg and Isaac Simon, who founded this project in 2020, Jewish Original Media is a multimedia educational platform focusing on Jewish history and life. With the help of NextGenInc., Jewish Original Media is working to produce a user-friendly and in-depth geo-timeline of the important events in Jewish history.

MAKE THEIR MEMORY SHINE

Started by Jewish students concerned with antisemitism in the Netherlands, the Make Their Memory Shine (MTMS) Movement believes that social interaction can bring about Holocaust commemoration in a dynamic and meaningful way, which will, in turn, combat all types of ignorance and hatred. MTMS brings education to the streets by having communal cleanups of the Stolpersteine Steps, commemorative events, and research highlighting the sites of the Holocaust.

PEACE IN OUR SCHOOLS

Peace in Our Schools is an inter-faith mission-based project working to further non-violent conflict resolution, inter-faith dialogue, and world peace. In 2021, with the support of NextGenInc., they held an in-person peace camp in Georgia and Bosnia. Peace camps last three days for school children and young adults aged 14-25.

JEWISH GOLF INITIATIVE

Located in the UK, the Jewish Golf Initiative’s (JGI) mission is to impact the Jewish community through the sport of golf positively. The JGI creates global networking opportunities, fun and interactive events for golfers and non-golfers alike, donation drives, strong inter-faith relations, and events for people with disabilities.

UNIONE GIOVANI EBREI D’ITALIA (UGEI)

The Unione Giovani Ebrei d’Italia (UGEI), since May 1995, has been coordinating and uniting the Jewish youth associations and the young Jews of Italy within those organizations. Throughout the year, the UGEI host Holocaust memorial and inter-faith events, attend conferences, and gather the young Jews of Italy together. The official press organ of the UGEI is HaTikwa Journal.

YOUNG SOCIAL ENTERPRISE

The Young Social Enterprise, inspired by the Jewish value of Tikkun Olam, is a program for Jewish high school students interested in learning about the environment and sustainability. Specifically focusing on the African continent, the contestants of YSE build a sustainable entrepreneurial mechanism to help the people of Africa.

YALLAGAN

Yallagan is a platform for all types of Jewish events if it’s a Shabbaton, educational seminar, or cooking class. Once you become a member, you can search and register for any event. Their goal is to make it easier for Jews and Jewish event planners to draw attention to their occasions and connect, building the Jewish community further.

Start-Up Nation Mentorship (SUNM) seeks to pair student leaders of exceptional promise with top Israeli industry and government heads. The program enables students who would otherwise not engage with the incredible opportunities Israel has to offer to develop meaningful, lasting relationships with Israelis who are at the center of the dynamic global economy.

RESULTS

PERCEPTION ON ISRAEL

BEFORE SCALE IS FROM 1-10 AFTER

Start-Up Nation Mentorship measures its impact on the Fellows’ opinion of their selected industry and Israel before the program.1 After working with their mentors for several months, SUNM Fellows are surveyed again on their perceptions of Israel. 2

19 campuses with SUNM Fellows

238 SUNM Fellows matched with an Israeli Mentor (+86%)

OCTOBER ‘21 FALL RETREAT CAMPUS EVENT

In early October 2021, Start-Up Nation Mentorship Leadership and Campus teams gathered at the World Jewish Congress New York Headquarters for a three-day retreat centered around innovation, transferring information, inspiring others, immersive professional development, and discussing goals and strategies. The postretreat success delivered over 100 Fellows recruited within a month of the retreat. Guest speakers at the retreat include David Sable (CoFounder and Partner of DoAble), Max August (Founder of the Israel Summit), and Zvika Netter (CEO & Co-Founder of Innovid).

208 Active Mentors (+30%)

CAMPUS DINNERS

In March 2022, Judah Taub, the managing director of Hetz Ventures (Forbes 30 Under 30), spoke on Israel’s start-up ecosystem at Yale University. Students joined in-person and SUNM Fellows from across the country tuned into the conversation via Zoom. This event sparked an increase in SUNM’s recruiting success at Yale

Campus dinners were held with the cohorts of nonJewish SUNM Fellows to build relationships with their Israeli mentors and learn more about Israel in the context of their fields of interest. SUNM Campus Directors hosted the dinners at UC Berkeley, Yale, Duke, Vanderbilt, and Northwestern.

On a scale out of 10, there is an increase in the opinion of the Fellows’ chosen industry, an increase in their perceptions of Israel, and an extremely high increase in readiness to engage with business in Israel. 3 On campus, there was an increase in willingness to join business organizations related to Israel.

Opinion of their chosen industry Perception of Israel Willingness to engage with tech/innovation in Israel

FELLOWSHIP GROWTH

Number of Fellows

Winter ‘20

‘22

MAY WANG, YALE UNIVERSITY (JUNE 2022)

Anna is warm, friendly, and very approachable. We discussed work-life balance, the fulfilling career and law, and how to explore different career paths. It was very inspiring to see somebody who was able to move beyond the conventional expectations of the legal industry, because I had been so worried that being a lawyer meant reading and writing extremely boring documents all day. Instead, Anna gets to sit in on exciting conversations, advise and counsel, and lend her lawyer hat perspective to difficult challenges for her company. She is so generous with her time and has let me know that we will go ahead and set up monthly calls!

Mentor: Anna Vainberg, Vice President (Legal) at OurCrowd

FRANCISCO TAO BURGA MONTOYA, BROWN UNIVERSITY (JUNE 2022)

BRANDON LINDSEY, DUKE UNIVERSITY (JUNE 2022)

I learned what a position like mine [or the one I am seeking] would be in the real world. I learned from this how tech start-up heavy Israel. It’s just insane how many businesses are being started, and it seems to be a very exciting place! My mentor was able to share some important information, and I feel if I were to reach out again, he’d be more than happy to talk to me [...] I got more perspective…most of my mentors up to this point have been young people, maybe a year or two older than me, with a little bit of experience, but they don’t really know what’s going on. So, it was nice to hear from somebody who’s been in the field for a while. Afterward, I was more encouraged to go into the field I was most interested in.

Mentor: David Apfelbaum, Principal at Gefen Capital

SUNM CAMPUSES

UNITED

STATES

• Duke University

• Brown

• Yale

• Columbia University

• Berkeley

• University of Pennsylvania

• Cornell University

• Harvard University

• The University of Chicago

• Vanderbilt University

• Princeton University

• Northwestern University

• Standford University

• Western University

• Queen’s University

• McGill University

• University of Toronto

• University of Cambridge

• University of Oxford

GROWTH OVERVIEW

The growth function works to ensure an ample supply of mentors across the demanded fields, maintain relationships with 200+ existing mentors and acquire new mentors with expansion strategies.

FEATURED MENTORS

Ben Weiss

Venture Partner

SoftBank Ventures

Orit Weissman

Founding Partner Goldman Sachs Israel

MENTOR RETENTION EVENT

In January 2022, two mentor community meetings were hosted via Zoom, updating mentors on the achievements and activities of SUNM; discussing opportunities to bring in new mentors within the current mentors’ networks; and obtaining feedback from mentors on SUNM organizational improvement.

+ +

Mentors attended

Introductions to new mentors were created

START-UP NATION VOICES

Oren Hafet

Deputy CEO

Google Israel

Fleur Hassan-Nahoum

Deputy Mayor Jerusalem

The Start-Up Nation Membership’s podcast continued into its second season. Seven new episodes were produced during the 2021-2022 AY, resulting in 600+ listeners from six continents. Some featured guests included Gai Berkovich, COO of Waze; Daniel Taub, Former Ambassador of Israel to the UK; Meir Brand, Vice Presiden, Google; and Maxime Cohen, Professor, McGill University.

Hillel Schuster

Managing Director

KPMG Israel

Rafi Sweary

President & Co-Founder WalkMe

In February 2022, the World Jewish Congress hosted the first-ever Jewish Youth Assembly (JYA), an initiative for 15- to 18-year-olds to learn from each other, hear from experts and prepare for their future as the leaders of global Jewry.

75 high school students from over 20 countries gathered virtually and met with leading representatives from 11 Jewish communities affiliated with the World Jewish Congress spanning five continents, to learn about challenges and opportunities in different parts of the world. The communities represented included Argentina, Brazil, Bulgaria, Estonia, France, Israel, Russia, Serbia, South Africa, Sweden, and the United Kingdom. 20 countries

20 COUNTRIES REPRESENTED

75 students

11 delegations

5 continents

Students then met in committees that addressed major issues facing the Jewish people, such as online hate, Holocaust remembrance, and Jewish unity. After hearing from experts on various topics, the committees drafted and adopted resolutions that offered their generation’s solutions.

WJC President Ronald S. Lauder spoke at the closing session of the JYA, emphasizing the significance of the event and its unique relevance to educating a new generation of Jewish leaders. The event also hosted H.E. Nachman Shai, Minister of Diaspora Affairs of Israel; Katharina von Schnurbein, European Commission Coordinator on combatting Antisemitism; and Jonathan Braun, president of the World Union of Jewish Students.

OVERVIEW DELEGATIONS

The groups of Highschoolers were split into 11 different delegations, learning about the Jewish communities in Argentina, Brazil, Bulgaria, Estonia, France, Israel, Russia, Serbia, South Africa, Sweden, and the United Kingdom.

RESOLUTIONS

EXAMPLE RESOLUTION:

THE PRESENT IS OUR FUTURE “ ONLINE HATE

The Jewish Youth Assembly replicates the World Jewish Congress’s structure of drafting and adapting resolutions to uphold, surrounding the Jewish community’s most pressing issues. Drafting these resolutions allows high schoolers to build problem-solving techniques, collaboratively work together, research their history, and learn from community leaders and experts.

Giving students who participate in the Jewish Youth Assembly first-hand access to learn about the issues the WJC is tackling invites them to have a deeper understanding of the Global Jewish community and the day-to-day deliberations of the World Jewish Congress.

The resolutions drafted by the high schoolers guide the World Jewish Congress on what young Jews need for their Jewish future and the present.

JYA RESOLUTIONS PASSED

Read the Resolutions

RECOGNIZING that discrimination against the Jewish people had started long before the rise of Nazism and has spread globally for thousands of years, evidenced by, i.e., the Protocols of the Elders of Zion and other hateful conspiracies, specifically the ones promulgated in the times of Covid-19;… BEARING IN MIND that the internet is a powerful global form of communication, that can be used both in positive and negative ways, where hate speech may proliferate exponentially and is challenging to stop or remove; ACKNOWLEDGING that online hate speech and the spread of misinformation, specifically directed against the Jewish people, being expressed as anti-Zionism or other forms of prejudice, camouflages deeply antisemitic attitudes;… ENCOURAGES social media platforms to create mechanisms to educate their users on issues that may be surrounded by hate speech and to implement software on their platforms for the purp pose of detecting and deterring hate speech, while promoting awareness;…

KEYNOTE SPEAKERS

Amb. Ronald S. Lauder President of the World Jewish Congress

Nachman Shai Diaspora Affairs Minister of Israel

Katerina von Schnurbein European Commission Coordinator on Combatting Antisemitism and Fostering Jewish Life

Jonathan Braun President of the World Union of Jewish Students

Integral to working towards a solid and secure global Jewish present and future, WJC NextGen has four powerful partnerships, including with Jewish on Campus (JOC), the World Union of Jewish Students (WUJS) who is our NextGenInc. initiative co-partner, the European Union of Jewish Students (EUJS), and the Latin American Student Union (FEJJLA).

OVERVIEW

JEWISH ON CAMPUS

Jewish on Campus is the movement of the Jewish future. We seek to revive pride in Judaism by emboldening a new generation of Jews through education, social media campaigning, and grassroots organizing. As a movement of young Jewish people, we seek to end antisemitism on college campuses and beyond.

EUROPEAN UNION OF JEWISH STUDENTS

The European Union of Jewish Students (EUJS) is a pluralistic, inclusive and non-partisan umbrella organisation. We support Jewish student unions throughout Europe and represent its members in international institutions and organisations.

Founded in 1978, we currently have 36 member organisations, spanning from Russia to Scandinavia to the United Kingdom.

EUJS is led by the president, executive director, and eight board members who are elected by EUJS member organizations at the EUJS General Assembly. The EUJS headquarters are located in Brussels, Belgium.

WORLD UNION OF JEWISH STUDENTS

The World Union of Jewish Students is the central, global, democratically elected Jewish Student leadership network, led by students for students. WUJS serves as an umbrella organization, uniting and representing independent Jewish student associations working in over 50 countries around the world.

The World Union of Jewish Students and NextGen have a strong partnership and work on our think-tank initiative NextGenInc. together.

LATIN AMERICAN STUDENT UNION

FEJJLA, Federación de Jóvenes Judíos de Latinoamérica, is the Federation of Jewish Youth of Latin America. They serve as the representative body of Jewish students across Latin America.

& MORE

NEXTGEN

ADVISORY COMMITTEE

The advisory committee of WJC NextGen hosts top Jewish leaders to help discuss, guide, and envision where the NextGen department should foresee itself in the coming years. As WJC NextGen, we seek to provide top support and resources to Jewish students globally.

WHAT ELSE NEXTGEN?

• Meeting with the first European Commission Coordinator on Combatting Antisemitism, Katerina von Schnurbein

• WJC Jewish Diplomatic Corps. Member and Jewish Pride Activist Ben M. Freeman presenting at the Cube

• JD Adam Hummel presented on Sarah Aaronsohn: Israel’s First Female Spy

• A workshop on antisemitism and mental health: Resilience in the Age of Online Hate

• World Union of Jewish Students and European Union of Jewish Students Shabbaton

Abigail Tisch Entrepreneur Brown University

Aidan Gloub Former Lauder Fellow Harvard University

Caterina Cognini Former Lauder Fellow Ca’ Foscari University of Venice

Vanina Meyer Former Lauder Fellow The Geneva Graduate Institute

Elias Dray Former President of the European Union of Jewish Students

Avital Grinberg President of the European Union of Jewish Students

Camila Tussie Former Lauder Fellow Harvard University

Julia Jassey Co-Founder and CEO of Jewish on Campus

Jonathan Braun President of the World Union of Jewish Students

THE CUBE

SPECIALLY DESIGNED

The Cube is a co-working space designed for Jewish students. Based in the heart of New York City, the Cube is available for individual work, hosting events, and holding meetings for all WJC NextGen and WJC Jewish Diplomatic Corp members, as well as partner organizations.

The Cube also hosts events, welcoming the New York Jewish community to learn, engage, and delve into crucial conversations on Jewish culture and society, current events, and more.

Individuals or Organizations can request to book the Cube.