My name is Harel Chait, and I am a person with blindness and a kidney transplant who lives in Israel. I work as a consultant, focused on web accessibility, for people with disabilities. Among my clients are corporations, government offices, and health services. I have been doing this work for about nine years, and participated [click to continue...]
My name is Matan Koch and I am RespectAbility’s Director of Jewish Leadership. Over the next few weeks you will notice that the Shabbat Smile continues its focus on the very best practices and exemplars of Jewish inclusion. The primary goal is to bring a new substance to your Shabbats. Both the weekly messages and our [click to continue...]
As we gear up for a light-filled holiday of menorahs with dripping candles, dreidels spinning in our surroundings, songs sung in our synagogues and homes and gifts getting wrapped for our loved ones, I want us to stop and think about another key aspect: food that we will prepare and/or share with family, friends, colleagues, [click to continue...]
An amazingly talented Jewish filmmaker with disabilities, Aaron Wolf, has created a terrific film, Restoring Tomorrow, that will be a PBS special this Sunday night at 7:30pm (PST) in select cities. The filmmaker, Aaron Wolf, is a wonderful storyteller and a mensch. The film is about Jewish renewal, hope, and how we connect our past with the present and [click to continue...]
Shalom friend! I hope you had a great Thanksgiving! With so much goodness to go around, here are several very important invitations and updates: We would love for you to join us for our holiday party on Wednesday, December 4th, from 4:00-7:00 PM. Food will be kosher and you, your family and your friends are all invited. [click to continue...]
In this week’s Torah portion, we read about the death of Sarah, but more importantly we read the most fascinating exchange around the purchase of her grave plot. The people of the land on which Abraham finds himself greatly respect him and venerate him. As such they are very eager to give him the plot [click to continue...]
As we prepare for Shabbat, I’m so pleased to share with you that the Project Moses website is live, at www.respectability.org/projectmoses, and that we are accepting applications. With that excitement, I’m asking for your help. For those who have not yet read about it in a previous Shabbat Smile, Project Moses is RespectAbility’s new leadership program to [click to continue...]
Tomorrow in Iowa, eight campaigns are set to participate in a history-making Accessibility, Inclusion, and Outreach Conference focused specifically on issues that affect people with disabilities. This is important, as while recent polling suggests that voters with disabilities themselves are more enthusiastic about participating in the 2020 elections than the nation at large, none of the [click to continue...]
“It’s awesome to see our participants smiling when we’re at a volunteer site,” said Bri Nichols, a Program Coordinator for JF&CS CHAI Works. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen a frown!” CHAI Works is a community-based day program for adults with disabilities offered through Jewish Family & Children’s Service. With locations in Waltham and Canton, [click to continue...]
At the beginning of the holiday season, Rabbi Daniel Dorsch delivered a sermon from his brand new, inclusive sanctuary at Congregation Etz Chaim. Read his entire sermon, republished with his permission, below. I met Anna (not her real name) for the first time when I was a chaplain at Columbia Presbyterian Hospital in New York. I [click to continue...]
