JTA: The Global News Service of the Jewish People

Loose Change: Chabad in Buffet land, recession hits AZ synagogues, and changes in Jewish higher ed

By Jacob Berkman · May 1, 2009

Some  really interesting stories floating around the Jewish media this week.

• The New York Jewish Week profiles Congregation Emanu El in Houston, which has a supplementary high school education program that cuts across denominational lines and draws in students not because they have to be in class but because they want to be in Hebrew school
• Synagogues in Arizona have been hit hard by the recession, reports the Jewish News of Greater Phoenix.
• Warren Buffet is about to hold his annual conference for some 35,000 shareholders in Berkshire Hathaway, and Chabbad will set up an outpost for those seeking Jewish fare and services, says chabbad.org.
• My colleague at JTA, Dina Kraft, has an interesting story about American-based Israelis being forced to return back to Israel because of the recession.
• The Forward notes that cuts to the Conservative movement’s Jewish Theological Seminary and the Reform’s Hebrew Union College because of the economic downturn are changing the landscape of higher Jewish education.
• The http://www.thejewishweek.com/viewArticle/c36_a15620/News/New_York.html">Jewish Week says that there is a campaign to try to save the New York campus of the HUC.
• And the LA Jewish Journal's God Blog weighs in on a new study that claims the Jewish GDP is about $10 billion.