Federation brings Student to Student to Pittsburgh
The program is now in 47 communities across the United States and two Canadian provinces.
What’s the best way to teach non-Jewish students about Judaism? Student to Student thinks it has the answer.
An experiential program, Student to Student brings together Jewish and non-Jewish high school students to learn about Judaism through personal storytelling.
The program sends Jewish teens into local classrooms to talk peer to peer about Jewish life, answer questions and break down stereotypes, according to Fawn Chapel, executive director of Student to Student.
“In 1992, the program was created by the former Executive Director Batya Abramson Goldstein. She was the executive director of the Jewish Community Relations Council [of St. Louis] and was asked to go to schools and talk about Judaism,” Chapel explained. “She said the kids looked so bored and she thought, ‘There has to be a different way to do this.’”
Student to Student started with a handful of students in St. Louis. It was Chapel, after Goldstein brought her on board as the program’s director, who decided to take the program national, starting in three cities: Washington, D.C., Indianapolis, Indiana, and Des Moines, Iowa.
“Eventually the JCRC said, ‘This isn’t really our mission to be a national organization,’ and they spun it off,” she explained.
The organization spent a few years as an independent entity before the Jewish Federations of North America absorbed it in 2024.
The program is now in 47 communities across the United States and two Canadian provinces, Chapel said.
This year, the Jewish Federation of Greater Pittsburgh is bringing Student to Student to the Steel City. Rhiannon Yates is serving as the program’s coordinator.
“My academic background focused heavily on history, Holocaust studies and the way prejudice and social division developed over time,” Yates explained.
She said that through her studies she developed an appreciation for education as “something transformative and not just academic.”
Yates said she is building the program with Federation from the ground up. She was hired six months ago and has spent the bulk of her time “meeting people, having coffee, getting to know people in really meaningful ways,” in preparation for Student to Student’s launch this fall.
Student to Student will be holding a series of information sessions this summer, including at both the Squirrel Hill and South Hills Jewish Community Centers.
“What’s really important to me,” Yates said, “is reaching those Jewish kids in the suburbs because more and more Jewish families are moving further outside the city.”
That means the program is even more relevant, she explained.
“Some of the students I talked to, they’re the only Jewish kid in their high school, so it serves a dual role: telling non-Jewish kids about Judaism and giving Jewish kids that might feel isolated a chance to have community with other Jewish kids,” she said.
The first local cohort will include 12 students — sophomores, juniors and seniors — four of whom have already been recruited. Students can apply themselves or they can be nominated by parents, friends or rabbis.
The goal, Yates said, is six presentations a semester.
Once students have been identified, there will be a training session led by Yates and Chapel.
“There’s a presentation outline but its not rote memorization,” she said. “The first section is about Shabbat and how we’re going to talk about how we celebrate Shabbat. We don’t lead or end with antisemitism because we don’t want that to be the first or last thing people think about.”
The important thing, she said, is that the sessions are student-led, although an adult, most likely Yates, will attend the presentations along with the students.
Identifying student ambassadors is only one side of the coin, however. Finding schools that are interested in participating is the other half — a mission Yates has been embracing.
“I am working with suburban schools, religious schools. I had a meeting with Pittsburgh Public Schools,” she said. “In other cities, the religious community has been really interested in bringing this in. I’m hoping to bring it into one of the Catholic schools. I think that interfaith conversation is really important.”
It’s the students, though, whom Yates has met so far in her new role, who have left the largest impression.
“The teens I’ve talked to so far have surprised me over and over again,” she said. “They’re so thoughtful and they want to talk about this, and in a tough time, too. I find that pretty honorable.”
More information about the Student to Student program can be found at jewishpgh.org/info/student-to-student/. PJC
David Rullo can be reached at drullo@pittsburghjewishchronicle.org.
comments