OPEN BOOK

Kolel Wins Prestigious Covenant Grant

Kolel is proud to announce that it has been awarded a large grant by The Covenant Foundation to create Project Open Book: The Kolel Resource Library. This on-line resource will allow Kolel to publish and disseminate its "signature" courses and events in digital format for use by institutions and groups, and to create an on-line learning environment for use by individuals. Downloading and CD capability, in modules that will include video, audio and printed materials will be on a special Project Open Book website that will be launched by the fall of 2008.

Project Open Book will take the five areas in which Kolel has been recognized as a leader in the field of adult education: Basic Judaism, Women and Judaism, Conversion to Judaism, Jewish Texts, and Jewish Parenting and Family Life and turn its courses and one-night events in those subjects into power-point presentations, guided learning modules, video and audio presentations, textual sources and facilitator guides. Individuals anywhere in the world can study with Kolel in an accessible and easy way; and organizations without the benefit of Kolel's faculty or physical presence can use its time-tested and recognized materials to fit their own communities. With Kolel's new partnership with the BJCC, it is envisioned that these materials will be of special interest to JCCs throughout North America as well as synagogues, study groups, small communities, women's groups, and of course, individual learners who now make up an "e-learning" community that numbers in the millions.

The Covenant Foundation is a program of the Crown Family Foundation and the Jewish Education Service of North America.The Foundation supports creative approaches to programming, while celebrating and building on existing strengths within the field of Jewish education in North America. It strengthens educational endeavors that perpetuate the identity and heritage of the Jewish people across all denominations and in all settings. The Covenant Awards recognize the achievements of exceptional Jewish educators who have distinguished themselves through their creativity, commitment, and talent. In 2005 Rabbi Elyse Goldstein was honoured to receive the Covenant Award for Outstanding Jewish Educators.

Baruch Sienna, a senior Jewish educator who is Kolel's webmaster, author of its weekly on-line parasha, and faculty member, will be the project author and manager, and Rabbi Goldstein will be the curriculum and content supervisor.