Blog | The Jerusalem Intercultural Center

Parents Association Handbook: Definitive Guide to Parents Associations in East Jerusalem

One of the side products of lockdown is having the opportunity to summarize knowledge gained from unique processes, and being able to compile it all in one place. Such is the case with the Parents Association Handbook, which was recently finished by our East Jerusalem Desk Director, Ezadeen El-Saad, who has been working with Parents Associations in East Jerusalem for the past 5 years.

New book on Parents Associations

Ezadeen has been working closely with several Parents Associations, especially in Sur Baher, Silwan and Ras el-Amud, among others. (You can read a little bit about it here.) The book describes all the processes they went through, from start to finish.

Table of contents

When we started several years ago, the Parents Associations consisted of a few dominant leaders in the community. They met only sporadically, and only when there were specific problems. Meetings did not have set agendas, no one took minutes and there was no official documentation of the meetings. They served mainly to react to actions of a principal, or to a certain problem in the schools. The Parents Associations never initiated anything. They were afraid to act because they weren’t familiar with the bylaws of the national Parents Association or with their rights as an Association or as parents. They did not know that it was their right to work in cooperation with the principal.

As a first step, Ezadeen called a number of meetings with central Parents Associations, including in A-Tur, Silwan, Abu Tor, Jebel Mukaber, Sur Baher and Ras el-Amud, which are considered particularly strong Parent Association. He explained:

The different rights and obligations afforded Parents Associations by law
What Parents Associations can accomplish
How to achieve results, in areas that included: student achievements, maintenance of the school, and in parent involvement in their children’s education, in cooperation with the school principals and school administrations.

At first, representatives were quite skeptical. However, as time went on, he gained the trust of the Parents Associations, and together, they worked, together with the local principals, on a broad range of initiatives that helped to build community – and improve education and school atmosphere – in the schools. After the initial workshops, the Parents Association learned how to build and follow through on specific work plans. They also learned how to create subcommittees – such as cultural activities, behavior, trips, study guidance, maintenance, and more – according to the school’s needs.

The processes, in the words of the parents

In this book, he’s compiled all the instructions, all the relevant materials, all the relevant protocols, case studies from different schools, and more. for an effective and influential Parents Association, one that will help to improve education. It also includes a chapter about learning during the Covid pandemic. Given the intense crowding in East Jerusalem schools, the Parents Associations closed schools in East Jerusalem in March 2020, long before schools throughout Israel were closed, and they stayed closed until the end of the 2019 – 2020 school year. This act was seen as a major contributor to a low rate of infection in East Jerusalem during Israel’s first lockdown in March – May 2020.

Parents activities

The guide includes photos from a variety of activities organized and implemented by the Parents Associations. These included:

Drawing and essay exhibit

Accompanying the construction of a schoolyard in Silwan;
Establishment of Facebook pages to build community, encourage discussion among parents, and document activities;
Production of 12th grade graduation ceremonies in Sur Baher;
Produced an exhibit of drawings and essays written and drawn by students;
Special days for Teacher Appreciation and Family Day at a special education school in Sur Baher;

Even more examples of activities parents produced with schools

Construction of a school yard, and more

There’s also a page that thanks the Leichtag Foundation and to the Jerusalem Foundation who have supported of the Parents Association project. Many thanks!

Thanks to partners

And many thanks to Ezadeen! May we have much more success with the Parents Association project!

Naomi Roff2021-03-20T08:20:00+00:00February 12th, 2021|Blog, Effective Activism, On Jerusalem, Palestinians/Arabs|

Little Prince – Continuing to Lead Processes toward a Clean City in Jerusalem

The Little Prince (and its website)has been leading processes of cleanliness in Jerusalem since 2017. One of its main objectives has been to engage the Jerusalem Municipality in adopting policies and practices to make Jerusalem a cleaner city. Indeed, the Municipality has followed suit and made a clean Jerusalem one of its highest priorities. In mid-December, the Jerusalem Municipality opened its own clean city page:

https://www.jerusalem.muni.il/he/residents/environment/

The page describes the Municipality’s efforts to make Jerusalem a cleaner city as well as the entire Municipality’s commitment, including that of Mayor Moshe Lion.

Municipal web page on clean city

It also includes links to different areas that contribute to a clean city – recycling, city beautification, sanitation, parks, composting, and more.

Ways to help make Jerusalem clean

And it was reported on here, by JICC director Hagai Agmon-Snir:

Many thanks to the Jerusalem Foundation and the US Embassy in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv for its continued support of the Little Prince!

Naomi Roff2021-02-13T10:03:51+00:00February 5th, 2021|Blog, Effective Activism, The Little Prince - Cleaning Jerusalem Together|

MiniActive Makes 106 Tutorial Video

We’ve described here about how MiniActive is helping the Palestinian populations improve their surroundings in Jerusalem. Since its founding in 2012 MiniActive has registered tens of thousands of complaints, bringing about a revolutionary change in the way the municipality provides services to the Palestinian residents of East Jerusalem.

Downloading the 106 app

The Jerusalem Municipality recently launched a new mobile app that enables residents to register complaints with the 106 hotline, supplementing the work of the telephone-based hotline. However, while it is possible to write requests and complaints in Arabic, the whole app platform – downloading, signing up, entering some information for tracking – is in Hebrew.

Even types of complaints are listed only in Hebrew

Enter MiniActive. They’ve created a video on how to use the new 106 mobile app. The video shows how to download the app, how to sign up and insert all the necessary information, how to use its system that also plots the complaints on a map, and how to file a complaint using the app. You can view the entire video here.

Details can be described in Arabic

Using this app will make MiniActive’s work – and its ripple effect of inspiring the rest of the Palestinian community in East Jerusalem – even more accessible. Can’s wait to see how it’ll upgrade their work!

Many thanks to the Leichtag Foundation‘s Jerusalem Model for their support of this summertime initiative for youth. And many thanks to the Jerusalem Foundation and to Natan for their ongoing support of MiniActive!

Naomi Roff2021-02-06T11:03:41+00:00February 1st, 2021|Blog, Effective Activism, MiniActive|

Even Coffee is a Multicultural Business

Cultural Competence is needed everywhere – from healthcare, to welfare and city services, even to your coffee provider and other workplaces.

We’ve found that the HoliGame, produced as a joint project of the JICC’s Cultural Competency Desk and the Israeli Forum for Employment Diversity, has been a useful tool in introducing important concepts of cultural competency while having a bit of fun.

On January 18, 2021, the desk led a session of HoliGame with the Israeli division of the Nespresso coffee company.

Diversity workshop for Nespresso

Noa Tron, Director of the Israeli Forum for Employment Diversity, opened the session with a fascinating lecture on the importance of diversity in organizations, especially in light of the diversity in Israeli society. She also spoke about the viability of diversity, the immense benefits that a diverse and inclusive work environment has for the organization, given the great diversity of the society in which we live. More than 50 managers and workers gathered via Zoom to discuss dilemmas and questions surrounding events, dates and holidays in the Israeli calendar and other issues that often arise in a diverse work environment.

Michal, vice president of human resources at Nespresso, said as she opened the meeting:

Nespresso, as an organization, has set a goal of expanding and deepening its diversity, given the enormous benefits of a diverse and multi-identity work environment, and has been undergoing this process for the past two years. Therefore, as managers, employees and actors in an organizational environment, if we just open up our thinking about the existing diversity – with all the dilemmas, challenges – and opportunities – that this diversity entails – we will profit from an organization with a rich and interesting work environment, which is much better for its employees.

Here’s a Facebook post from Rachely Ashwal:

Many thanks to Nespresso, and to the Israeli Forum for Employment Diversity!

Naomi Roff2021-02-13T09:54:47+00:00January 21st, 2021|Blog, Cultural Competence, Cultural Competence in the Workplace|

Little Prince – Making Jerusalem Clean through Public-Private Partnership

The Little Prince began almost four years ago (in the spring of 2017) with a goal: engage all of Jerusalem residents in one goal – making Jerusalem a clean city. Part of that goal – engaging the Jerusalem Municipality as a full partner in the process.

Not just any Zoom meeting

Yes, indeed that has happened. This picture is ‘just’ a screen shot of a Zoom meeting waiting to begin. But it means the world – a recurring meeting, together with the Director of the Operations Division of the Jerusalem Municipality, demonstrating the true partnership that has developed, together with residents from all parts of the city. Here’s what our Tal Kligman, Director of the Little Prince initiative, had to say:

There is nothing like seeing the name of “The Little Prince” on the Zoom of the Jerusalem Municipality’s Director of Operations, to open the morning! This means that the partnership of the senior staff from the Operations Division (department managers, district managers and Itzik Nidam at the head) and the members of the Little Prince are significant and contribute to advancing processes.

This means that both sides understand the necessity of our partnership, and it means we are already deep into a work routine.

In general, residents can’t meet in the morning. But, see – yes we can! And senior municipal officials dedicate the morning hours to important issues and lo and behold! Residents are important.

This again shows the investment of of the Operations Division in public engagement, and its many successes:

Satisfied residents. Very satisfied!

Many compliments to the Operations Division, all its departments.

A much cleaner city.

Quick and efficient response to public inquiries and complaints.

A system that functions professionally and with seriousness.

Services and efficient functioning of the Operations Division.

These are significant accomplishments that took place as a result of the public participation. This has translated to:

Significant increase in the provision of reports by the municipal inspectors on cleanliness issues (littering, not picking up after dogs, leaving garbage bags outside of trash receptacles, and more).

Cleaning of many Public Private Spaces throughout the city as part of the Sanitation Department’s work plan. (The Municipality is not required to keep these places clean, but has agreed to do so. You can read about it here.)

Supervision of the work of cleaning subcontractors.

Adding compactors and cartons receptacles in shopping centers.

Cleaning of bus stops

Construction of rooms to hid trash bins in building complexes (in coordination with residents)

Regular days for clearing pruning and scrap

This is a small list of changes. We have no words to thank you, Operations Division, there’s no one like you.

Here’s Tal’s Facebook post in Hebrew:

Many thanks to the Jerusalem Foundation and the US Embassy in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv for its continued support of the Little Prince!

Naomi Roff2021-02-13T10:14:37+00:00January 13th, 2021|Blog, Effective Activism, The Little Prince - Cleaning Jerusalem Together|

MiniActive 2020 in Pictures

MiniActive has been transforming Palestinian society in East Jerusalem through its 1,000-strong network of women since 2012. You can read about the amazing MiniActive network in this blog category.

MiniActive helping in the fight against Covid-19: Reminding patients of home

But 2020 has been such a busy year, with so many activities and involvement with so many processes, sometimes seeing in pictures is best.

Here is MiniActive’s year in pictures. The writing is in Arabic, but the pictures say it all. Enjoy!

And many thanks to the Jerusalem Foundation, the US Embassy in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem, the Jerusalem Model, and to Natan for their ongoing support of MiniActive!

Naomi Roff2021-02-06T11:03:38+00:00January 6th, 2021|Blog, Effective Activism, MiniActive|

Making Souls Festival – Promoting Tolerance in Jerusalem for those with Mental Illness

For the past three years our Multicultural Activism Desk has been helping the Nefashot initiative to produce the Making Souls Festival at the end of November (you can see posts about it here and here).

Making Souls Festival Poster

Making Souls focuses on activism for mental health issues and tolerance toward issues relating to mental health. This year, the Making Souls Festival took place between November 29 – December 5, after we’ve been mentoring the group and the events since June. This year, even during – or maybe because of? – the Covid pandemic, there were 40 (!) events (80 events applied to take part, but only 40 were accepted), when in previous years there were between 20 – 30. This included engaging many more partners in creating the week of events. It seemed like the week filled a basic need for many people, especially during this period, to deal with mental health issues and to understand it is part of all of our lives. The week was an amazing success: More than 30% of the initiatives were in fields of arts and culture, and 2,400 people took part in real time, and the events and the awareness of the festival reached 12,000 people, more than double the audience reached in previous year. We continue to work with our friends and partners from Nefashot on moving forward – maintaining the special connections that were formed and blazing new paths.

The video in the Hebrew Facebook post below shows the week in pictures. Enjoy the diversity, breadth and depth of the events!

And, of course, many thanks to the Jerusalem Foundation, the Natan Fund and the U.S. Embassy Jerusalem, Tel Aviv Branch Office and U.S. Consulate General Jerusalem for helping us to advance tolerance and cross-cultural activism in Jerusalem.

Naomi Roff2021-03-20T08:24:56+00:00December 25th, 2020|Blog, Promoting Tolerance in Jerusalem|

Interview of our Tal Alafi, from the Multicultural Activism Desk, on the Shalem College Website

We’ve brought news of her accomplishments in advancing tolerance in Jerusalem many places in this blog (the latest can be found here, here and here), but Shalem College recently profiled our Tal Alafi, our Coordinator for Multicultural Activism. Here’s the link to the full article (Hebrew). Parts are excerpted and translated here:

Tal Alafi

Turning Activism an Effective Tool to Create Change: An Interview with Tal Alafi

Many of us want to make a difference, but we don’t always know what to do. Tal Alafi, a graduate majoring in Philosophy and Jewish Thought at the Shalem College and director of multi-cultural activism at the Jerusalem Intercultural Center, meets activists daily and accompanies them in their work for social change, with the goal of making Jerusalem a culturally competent city – a city that accepts and recognizes its various identities.

December 2020

A Collection of Small Changes Creates Significant Change

About a year ago, Tal graduated with a bachelor’s degree from the Shalem College and quickly integrated into the field of social activism. As a counselor at the Ein Prat Pre-Army Academy, she heard about the College from her friends, and chose to study Philosophy and Jewish Thought – a field that has always interested her. In the last year of her studies, Tal worked on a project at the Jerusalem Intercultural Center, and afterward she was offered a permanent position. In her role, she meets young activists of all backgrounds and ethnicities every day, and helps them bring about change and influence the fabric of life in Jerusalem.

Tal, what is the Jerusalem Intercultural Center?

The Jerusalem Intercultural Center (JICC) is an independent organization that works to help Jerusalem become culturally competent. Jerusalem, as a diverse city with people from different origins and religions, needs a place that knows how to accept and lead this process, and do it in the best way possible. Fortunately, there is a lot of awareness of multiculturalism in the public, but we need to know how to act correctly in order to bring about change in a way that everyone can express themselves.

What does your job involve?

As part of my work, I accompany activists and work to connect the residents and the relevant bodies in the municipality, to help them create change. In addition, I work to connect the different residents of the city: ultra-Orthodox, Arabs, secular and religious, and encourage connections between them. The residents are directly related to the moves that are taking place in the municipality and constitute a power multiplier in every initiative.

….

How do you turn activism into “effective activism”?

Sometimes we prefer to complain rather than do, and sometimes there is activist activity for change, but it does not bring about actual results. Our goal at the JICC is to turn activism into an effective tool that generates change, even small, because it that change that will ultimately lead to making a significant difference. The activists are working and we see results on the ground, because we are working with the municipality, with residents from all over the city. When Arabs, both ultra-Orthodox and secular all come together – it creates a strong force for municipal officials, who can change decisions. Good things happen thanks to a multicultural group working together.

Can you give an example of the impact led by residents?

It is very difficult to change the entire transportation system in Jerusalem, but there are many things that can be done along the way – making bus stops accessible, influencing the planning or changing of a line, and more. It is a small change, but a collection of small changes eventually leads to major changes in the transportation system. Another example is the issue of the cleanliness of the city, which greatly troubles Jerusalemites: as soon as residents entered the picture, change began, which, even if it is not perfect, is already part of a citywide goal. The most important part is that there is a mutual understanding that both the municipality and the residents need each other to improve the city, so they must learn to work together. Proper and good communication between the residents and the municipality is very important for things to happen on the ground.

Connection between people – even during a time of social distancing

In order to promote multiculturalism in the capital, Tal coordinates regular events that take place every year and provide a platform for the various populations in the city. One of these events is Jerusalemite Day of Diversity.

What is a Jerusalemite Day of Diversity?

Jerusalemite Day of Diversity takes place every year on Jerusalem Day and its goal is to connect populations and enable Jerusalemites to mark the day in a non-political, happy and connecting way. It includes tours of diverse neighborhoods in the city, art exhibitions, music performances and meetings between different communities. Jerusalem residents love the city, and we want to allow them to celebrate their day in a way they see fit, especially in the public space, to show the diversity that exists in the city, on a day that many Jerusalemites choose not to celebrate for one reason or another.

Is it possible to connect people and initiatives during Covid?

Absolutely yes – we adapt ourselves to the situation. We’ve moved online like many other places: I work from home, have meetings in the Jerusalem area mainly, and the events we produce also become online.

What are your plans for the future?

The JICC has been focusing on communities since its establishment, and now, more than ever, this issue is changing and taking on new meanings. We are thinking how Covid affects the community and how we connect between digital and physical communities. I’m personally concerned about this; What are people looking for in a community and what is a community today? I don’t have a clear answer to this and I am still learning about it. I think Covid is actually empowering the physical / geographically close community, because with the distance limitations we must stay close to home. But on the other hand, a significant portion of our lives has gone digital. I wonder what will be left of all this after this complex period is over.

Kol Hakavod Tal! Proud of our staff at the JICC.

Naomi Roff2021-03-20T08:24:41+00:00December 16th, 2020|Blog, Promoting Tolerance in Jerusalem|

MinActive on a Virtual Tour of 106 Municipal Hotline

Part of MiniActive‘s work to improve the surroundings of East Jerusalemites is knowing how municipal processes work. In order to facilitate this, MiniActive organized a virtual tour of the 106 Municipal Hotline in November.

Example of questions asked

More than 70 members participated in the meeting, which included touring the Hotline Command Center, together with an Arabic-speaking employee, as well as a question-and-answer period about the best uses for the 106 hotline – environmental problems and what are the best ways to register complaints – and for what kinds of problems – through the hotline. MiniActive volunteers also learned how to file complaints on the phone and on the app.

Here’s the link to the Facebook post in Arabic:

And many thanks to the Jerusalem Foundation, the US Embassy in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem, the Jerusalem Model, and to Natan for their ongoing support of MiniActive!

Naomi Roff2021-02-06T10:25:01+00:00December 8th, 2020|Blog, Effective Activism, MiniActive|

MiniActive Continuing to Help Meet Emergency Needs

We wrote here, here, here, and here about how MiniActive has helped Palestinian families in East Jerusalem meet urgent needs, including addressing food security.

Helping East Jerusalem families improve food security

Thanks to a donation from the Jerusalem Model, they continued to do so.

From raw materials

They distributed 50 food packages to families in Jebel Mukaber, Kufr Aqeb, Beit Hanina, Wadi Joz, Sheikh Jarrach, A-Tur, Anata, Abu Tor, Silwan, the Old City, Ras el-Amud, Issawiya.

Ready to go to families

The Covid crisis has hit East Jerusalem especially hard, and these food baskets provide important lifelines to families affected.

And many thanks to the Jerusalem Foundation, the US Embassy in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem, the Jerusalem Model, and to Natan for their ongoing support of MiniActive!

Naomi Roff2021-01-19T07:57:24+00:00December 3rd, 2020|Blog, MiniActive|