They stayed with host families in Buenos Aires and spent five days working on social action projects together with members of the local branch of Netzer Olami; the work included feeding the homeless at the Chavurah Social Assistance Center and painting classrooms at the Arlene Fern Day School. As part of their work, they met with Rabbi Sergio Bergman, a leader of Argentina’s Progressive community and founder of a network of voluntary organizations that has fed and clothed the needy during the country’s recent economic crisis. The students also visited a number of Jewish interest sites, including Avigdor, a pre-war agricultural colony for Jewish refugees from Nazi Germany, and the AMIA Jewish community headquarters building, which was bombed in the early 1990s, with heavy loss of life. In addition, they spent Shabbat with members of Buenos Aires’ Libertad Synagogue and Congregation NCI-Emanuel.

This was the second time an organized group of North American college students has spent time with Argentina’s Progressive Jews, the first having been in May, 2003. The Argentina Ambassadors program is sponsored by the Union for Reform Judaism’s KESHER College Department in association with the World Union, with funding from the David Heller Foundation, the Norman Lear Family Foundation Fund for Alternative Spring Break Programs of the Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism, the North American Federation of Temple Brotherhoods, and an anonymous donor. (source WUPJnews #160)