Another Great Year for B’Yachad Program
The JFS Community Engagement staff, along with 35 volunteers, delivered more than 165 B’Yachad Holiday Gift Bags to JFS clients in the community and residential living facilities. The bags included activities for mental and creative stimulation, sweet treats and a gift card to purchase essentials and groceries. Each bag included colorful, hand-designed Cards of Kindness made by local students and creative community volunteers. We’ve already heard from many recipients that their gifts and the lovely messages included on the cards were especially meaningful at this time of the year.
JFS is grateful to the volunteers for doing the mitzvah of delivering these packages of joy to clients! B’Yachad engaged 35 delivery volunteers and card makers, guided by the dedicated Steering Committee. Many thanks to Rena Glaser, Myndal Davis Silver, Sue Schwartz and Etta Lambright for their constant leadership and support of the program through the years!
In addition to the help of their members and constituents to raise critical funds to support our efforts, JFS collaborated with St. Paul Jewish agencies and synagogue partners to organize specific B’Yachad mitzvah activities for students and young children.
The annual B’Yachad campaign raised more than $6,000 to support the program as it evolved to a new model during COVID, ensuring the health and safety of community members who previously helped by shopping for and wrapping B’Yachad gifts. The JFS Community Engagement team couldn’t have accomplished any of this without the support and participation of donors and the amazing local network of Jewish organizations.