We believe in the strength and beauty of diverse communities where education honors everyone's dignity, recognizing that all people are created in God's image. As Rabbi Abraham Kook wrote, everything in life "teems with richness" and strives to grow and improve. Since everyone carries this divine spark, Jewish education must be available and accessible to all. It should help everyone reach their full potential.

“B'tzelem”  
Explanation of our artwork and process:

The agency’s sixth value names the belief in the Jewish concept of “B’tzelem Elohim,” or “In the image of God,” which reifies a commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion. This artwork captures that idea and suggests methods of practicing those values within our own, internal community. The gradated background represents a movement from dark to light, evoking the beginning of creation, the divine light, and hope from a chaotic start. The hues are also tied to the agency’s colors and branding as they transition from blue to green. Literal and metaphorical texture come through via a series of cutouts that are layered onto the background. At the top and bottom are abstracted depictions of identity, which move from the specific to the general. At the bottom of the work, different types of hair cut across the page like a reminder. Hair is personal and hair is political. Hair is impacted by age, ethnicity, religious identity, dis/ability, health status, and personal expression. The top presents a more general idea of diversity, a rainbow, with all of its manifold symbolism; beauty in all of the colors imaginable, recognition and celebration of all identities, but also, the clarity and magnificence that come after a storm. The storm and sky imagery connect to the cutout of the cloud, which is constructed out of a reflective surface. The reflection shows, of course, whoever stands in front of the work, forcing the viewer to directly engage with the emotionality of the piece as they become part of it, but also to literally see themselves as reflected in the milieu, as a represented face in our collective imagining of diversity. But the viewer’s reflection is not always clear; there are pieces of each person’s identity that are cloudy, or unknown, or have not yet been explored. Finally, the Hebrew word, “B’tzelem” acts as a focal point, tying each of the disparate images to a central theme. The word comprises little ripped pieces of paper in the agency’s colors. We are all more than our broken pieces, it declares, we are all reflected here, and we are all our best selves when we come together as one.