This Summer I used the UJS Leadership Fellowship grant to attend Summer U in Ioannina, Greece, where I was a ‘maker’ this summer.

Summer U is the week-long summer camp run by EUJS (European Union of Jewish Students), which takes place in a different European destination each year. There are around 300 Jewish participants, mostly from European countries, though this year there were also participants from elsewhere. This year’s venue was a hotel that EUJS booked out fully for a week. They provided kosher catering, and we had the whole site, pool, rooms, etc., for the programming. There are specialised speaker sessions, parties in the evenings, and always places for participants to chill—different participants definitely spend their week there in a variety of ways!

Being a maker is essentially being a madrich (leader), except whereas in the UK, often the madrichim are a number of years older than the participants, in Summer U, the makers and participants can equally be any age from 18 to 30. Makers go a week earlier to the Summer U venue to set up and prepare the site. During the week of Summer U itself, as well as facilitating various sessions with external speakers or organising and overseeing the activities, we were generally on call for any help or problems that participants had.

This was undoubtedly a great leadership experience in itself—we often had to think on our feet, and so on. One thing I will particularly take away for my leadership journey is the connections and understanding I gained of other Jewish experiences from people our age. The makers’ team, around 30 people, was very diverse (over 20 countries), and it was great to make close connections with them. I think we all underestimated how different Jewish life can be for those our age in, say, Latvia, compared to us in the UK, compared to Turkey, and so on. For just one example, on Shabbat, there was a range of understanding and preference from the makers—a number of makers clearly had a strong Jewish identity but self-identified as non-religious and wanted quite a different Shabbat to, for example, how the UK makers were used to UJS event Shabbats (which is what we felt most comfortable with). We obviously all had to compromise and work out how to provide an experience that would be meaningful and appropriate for all—but in so doing, I think we all understood quite how different the Jewish (youth) communities we come from do things. That, in particular—the maker team all learning from each other and making connections in different countries—was possibly the thing that will stick with me the longest term.

Thanks again to UJS, the Leadership Fellowship, and the grant for this opportunity!

Samuel Kramer - UJS Leadership Fellow 2023/24