CAJE Rep on M-DCPS Antisemitism Task Force

Posted on 02/21/2025 @ 05:00 AM

Tags: Jewish Schools & Educational Services

CAJE is excited to announce that Rabbi Efrat Zarren-Zohar, CAJE’s Executive Director, has been appointed to the Miami-Dade County Public School system’s Task Force on Antisemitism.

In response to rising hate, the school system created a task force led by Ines Meras, District Director of FACE- Family and Community Engagement, a program of Miami-Dade County Public Schools (M-DCPS).

Special thanks to Robert Brazofsky, District Director of Social Science for M-DCPS and Dr. Miriam Klein Kassenoff, the Curriculum Support Specialist on Holocaust Education for M-DCPS, who were instrumental in bringing her onto the Task Force as an educator and representative from the Jewish community.

In her ongoing efforts to educate public school teachers, Dr. Kassenoff is bringing renowned Author - Scholar - Writer Dara Horn to lead a day-long professional development workshop for M-DCPS teachers on Combatting Antisemitism through Cultural and Historical Understanding. The workshop is under the auspices of the University of Miami Holocaust Teacher Institute School of Education and Human Development as well as M-DCPS.

In addition, CAJE in partnership with Federation has developed a survey for Jewish teens in grades 6-12 about antisemitism that is designed to assess the experiences of Jewish teens regarding antisemitism in various settings. It is anonymous and takes about five minutes to complete.

The survey asks about:

• Demographics
• Feelings of Safety
• Experiences with Antisemitism
• Behavioral Changes (have teens modified their behavior due to antisemitism or hidden Jewish items to avoid being targeted)
• Reporting (measures confidence in schools’ ability to address antisemitism and the school’s reporting process)
• Engagement and Resources (asks what would help them feel safer and prouder to be Jewish at school, how they would like to engage in learning about antisemitism and Israel)