March 17, 2009

(San Francisco, CA) – The Jim Joseph Foundation announced today that it has awarded $3.5 million to the San Francisco Bay Area Jewish community, as part of an $11 million grant to five Jewish Community Federations, including the Bay Area, Los Angeles, Washington DC, Boston and the North Shore.

This grant provides emergency scholarships to Jewish families facing economic hardship due to the recent financial downturn. The Jim Joseph grant will provide much-needed financial assistance for families in need, and will be used to enable these families to keep their children attending Jewish preschools, day schools, and Jewish residential summer camps throughout much of Northern California. These institutions have been particularly hard hit by the downturn in the economy.

The Jewish Community Federation of San Francisco, the Peninsula, Marin and Sonoma Counties will administer the $3.5 million for the Federated communities in San Francisco, the East Bay and Silicon Valley. The Jim Joseph Foundation grant follows on the heels of the Federation’s own recent action that provided Jewish preschools and Day Schools with $225,000 in scholarship grants that made it possible for 89 families in the San Francisco Federation’s service area to keep their children enrolled.

The Jewish Community Federation of San Francisco will be working in partnership with the Bureau of Jewish Education, the Jewish Federation of Silicon Valley and the Jewish Community Federation of the Greater East Bay to implement this scholarship award process.

According to Daniel Sokatch, CEO of the Jewish Community Federation, “This is outstanding news for the entire Bay Area Jewish community, especially in these times of economic hardship. We are honored to be given this responsibility. It is a testament to the Jim Joseph Foundation’s commitment to Jewish education, and to our organization’s ability to bring about positive change in the world. With this funding, our schools and their students are more secure. The Jim Joseph Foundation has certainly raised the bar for Jewish philanthropists.”

The Jim Joseph Foundation has a history of partnering with the SF-based Jewish Community Federation by funding innovative projects and programs designed to enhance Jewish education in the Bay Area, including the Early Childhood Initiative's PJ Library, which provides Jewish themed books to young families, and BASIS, the Bay Area School Israel Synergy project in conjunction with the Bureau of Jewish Education.

The Jim Joseph Foundation, established in 2006, is committed to a sustained program of grant making in pursuit of a vision that leads to ever-increasing numbers of young Jews engaged in ongoing Jewish learning and choosing to live vibrant Jewish lives. The Foundation manages close to one billion dollars of assets, using all of its resources to foster compelling, effective Jewish learning for young Jews in the United States.

See the release from the Jim Joseph Foundation here.

For more information please contact:
- Angela Ingel, Marketing Director, 415.512.6246, angelai@sfjcf.org

###