Leadership & Responsibility: A Celebration of Small Rituals

“Jewish summer camp is the reason that, with the exception of Shabbat, you’ll never find me without a writing utensil. Or more accurately, you’ll never find me without a handful of writing utensils: one for me, and several to share. I developed this habit while working as a rosh edah, a unit head, at Camp Ramah in the Berkshires, and while it might sound like a small thing, my preparedness with writing utensils is actually part of a much larger leadership skill set that I had the opportunity to develop at camp.

My camp friends and I joke about being a ‘rosh for life,’ poking fun at the ways that our experiences have turned us into not only leaders at camp, but translated into ‘real-world’ responsibility as well. After summers full of schlepping benches and setting up programming spaces, we instinctively arrange the desks of our graduate school classrooms into a circle, or straighten them into rows. Instead of relying on and constantly checking our phones, we wear actual wristwatches to know the time. We keep our apartments clean, carefully assigning and sharing chores with our roommates and spouses.”

Continue reading JTS rabbinical student Paula Rose’s “Leadership & Responsibility: A Celebration of Small Rituals” in eJewish Philanthropy.