Global Caring
Global Caring works collaboratively with our partner city of Dnipro and other communities around the world, empowering them to enhance quality of life and helping to build a meaningful and vibrant Jewish future. To learn more about our Global Caring work, email Ariel.
Our Shared History
Before the 1990s, Jews were not free to leave the USSR and lived in difficult conditions. The American Jewish community invested considerable resources to support and advocate for Jews to be able to leave the USSR. Once that happened, American Jewish organizations that had invested considerable resources and effort advocating for Jews to be able to leave the USSR saw a need to also invest in revitalizing Jewish life in the former Soviet Union. The National Conference on Soviet Jewry suggested a partnership between Boston and Dnepropetrovsk, Ukraine. In May of 1994, the first official delegation from Boston travelled to Dnepropetrovsk (now Dnipro). Since then, the partnership has developed to provide critical support around medical needs, elderly care, special education, family support, and community revitalization. Learn more about our historic partnership with Dnipro.
Adopt-a-Bubbe/Warm Houses
In partnership with Boston-based Action for Post-Soviet Jewry (APSJ), a key organization in the Soviet Jewry movement, we support elderly Jews in Dnipro and 21 small towns in the vicinity with food parcels, clothing, and medicine — all tailored to the specific needs of the clients. Through these programs, we also support training for local volunteers working with the elderly population.
Beit Baruch
The only Jewish senior home in the Former Soviet Union, Beit Baruch was established in 2002 and modeled after Boston’s 2Life Communities. Beit Baruch receives financial support and professional guidance from 2Life Communities. Residents pay a reduced cost to live in the community, and enjoy an enriching Jewish life, in addition to medical care and support with daily activities. Beit Baruch hosts around 50 residents and provides rehab care for community seniors and social activities that integrate seniors with the larger Jewish community.
Educational Resource Center
The Educational Resource Center (ERC) of Dnipro brings attention and resources to special needs education in Ukraine. The center offers training and workshops for parents and educators, as well as specialists who work in schools. The ERC has been life changing for the 85 children and 10 young adults who are enrolled in the Center’s programs. Institutions and individuals across Ukraine look to the ERC for advice on disabilities issues. Additionally, the ERC is proud to have worked with the Ukrainian government to establish the country’s first bachelor’s degree program in special education.
Jewish Big Brothers Big Sisters (JBBBS)
In 2001, Jewish Big Brothers Big Sisters of Greater Boston established a partnership with Dnipro to form a youth mentorship program for the Jewish community. Since then, more than 300 — children including those with special needs — have been matched with Big Brothers and Sisters. JBBBS helps foster pride in Jewish identity through weekly gatherings and activities for “littles” and their families, and provides emotional support and opportunities to socialize. The program also offers psychological counseling and an opportunity to participate in a 10-day Jewish summer camp experience.
Jewish Medical Clinic (JMC)
The JMC set out to provide high-quality medical services to the Jewish population of Dnipro at a low cost. The clinic, which opened in February 2012, also offers care to the wider Dnipro community with discount rates for vulnerable members of the Jewish community. Volunteer physicians from Boston have provided consulting support to JMC physicians. In addition, with the ongoing conflict in eastern Ukraine, Boston physicians have provided much needed medical advice and have even traveled to Dnipro to help doctors with new techniques to aid those wounded in the fighting.
The American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee (JDC)
CJP supports worldwide community relief efforts through our partnership with the JDC, known as the global Jewish 9-1-1. In the Former Soviet Union, our funds care for the well-being of impoverished Jewish elderly living in 2,000 cities, towns and villages each year. In Dnipro, our partnership promotes revitalizing Jewish life for the next generation of Jewish leaders through the Jewish Community Center (JCC), summer camps, retreats, young leadership training, and the Active Jewish Teens (AJT) youth movement. Around the world, our support to the JDC assists Jews in danger, provides aid to the vulnerable, develops innovative solution to Israel’s most complex social challenges and responds to global crises affecting the Jewish community.
The Jewish Agency for Israel (JAFI)
In partnership with The Jewish Agency for Israel, CJP enables Jewish young adults from around the world to visit and experience Israel through Birthright and Masa Israel Journey. Through these initiatives, we create opportunities for young Jews to explore Israel, connect with their Jewish identity and develop meaningful relationships with Israelis. With nearly 50,000 Birthright participants per year, funding from CJP also ensures young Jews from less-equipped communities, such as the former Soviet Union, can enjoy the same iconic 10-day trip to Israel as their North American peers. Those interested in returning to Israel for longer are encouraged to sign up for Masa, which has hundreds of program options and offers participants the opportunity to live like locals, engage with Israeli people and culture, gain valuable work experience, and become leaders. Most recently, CJP established an assistance fund for Dnipro children and teens of low socioeconomic background to attend JAFI’s Jewish summer camp.
Visiting Moms
With professional guidance from Boston’s Jewish Family & Children's Service (JF&CS), the Dnipro Kehillah Project introduced the Visiting Moms program to Dnipro in 2017. Designed to serve young mothers in a community fraught with poverty, alcoholism, and economic disparity, we have partnered with the international Jewish women’s organization, Project Kesher, to run the project and expand to communities throughout Ukraine. Since 2017 there have been more than 180 visits of mentor mothers with new mothers.