Jewish Board of Family and Children’s Services — Changing Thousands of Lives
“Today we are bigger and better than ever and tonight’s celebration is one of the most successful we have ever had!” Alice Tisch Board of Trustees President of The Jewish Board of Family and Children’s Services told the festive assemblage. “With our integration of F.E.G.S.[Federation Employment Guidance Service] we expand our footprint of services and—as the largest social services agency in the State of New York—we are helping tens of thousands of New Yorkers live independent lives. We have a caring, true professional partnership with UJA Federation and — I’m honored to say that the Jewish Board stayed true to its glorious and historic roots.”
“It’s all about three words—Hope, Recovery and Resiience,” said Jewish Board’s CEO David Rivel of the agency which was founded 140 years ago. “While we work for 43,000 clients, we change lives one-at-a-time…. Whether you are a child or an adult, whether you are Jewish or not Jewish…whether you struggle with mental health challenges or…whether there is abuse or violence in your family, we give people hope that their life will get better. And we give them the tools to recover and the resilience to go forward and fight future challenges.”
UJA Federation of New York’s CEO Eric S. Goldstein declared: “We are UJA and proud of the network of extraordinary agencies that bring outstanding care and services to New Yorkers of all backgrounds. When FEGS was in crisis last year, it was the Jewish Board that stepped up to acquire the critical programming and integrate the services to tens of thousands of vulnerable New Yorkers who would continue to receive important care. Thanks to the Jewish Board there was not a single day of service disruption for a single FEGS client. We look forward to continuing our extraordinary partnership for years to come.”
The event—which raised $1.3 million— honored longtime Board members Erica R. Schwartz with its Saul Z. Cohen Leadership Award and the Yerman-Steinman Family with its Madeleine Borg Lifetime Service Award.
At our table were Jewish Board employees including the daughter and granddaughter of a counselor who had helped transform childrens’ lives including one—that of an Irish Catholic boy—now a productive adult— whose transformative journey was featured in a short animated video, which had the audience on its feet when he took “a bow.”
I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning journalism this Passover.
In this age of misinformation, our work is needed like never before. We report on the news that matters most to American Jews, driven by truth, not ideology.
At a time when newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall. That means for the first time in our 126-year history, Forward journalism is free to everyone, everywhere. With an ongoing war, rising antisemitism, and a flood of disinformation that may affect the upcoming election, we believe that free and open access to Jewish journalism is imperative.
Readers like you make it all possible. Right now, we’re in the middle of our Passover Pledge Drive and we still need 300 people to step up and make a gift to sustain our trustworthy, independent journalism.
Make a gift of any size and become a Forward member today. You’ll support our mission to tell the American Jewish story fully and fairly.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
Join our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.
Only 300 more gifts needed by April 30