The IKAR community will planted trees with Million Trees L.A., an initiative launched by Los Angeles Mayor, Antonio Villaraigosa, with the goal of planting ONE Million trees in our city over the course of the next few years.

IKAR partnered with PJA and MAZON to bring you an afternoon of learning and discussion with acclaimed author and founder and president of PANIM: The Institute for Jewish Leadership and Values, Rabbi Sid Schwarz. In his book, Judaism and Justice: The Jewish Passion to Repair the World, Rabbi Schwarz explores a community torn between its instincts for self-preservation and its desire to serve as an ethical 'light to the nations.' Our community's youngest members joined professional children's librarian Amy Muscoplat for an engaging and entertaining afternoon of stories, fingerplays, songs and more!

IKAR Hanukkah Bazaar
The IKAR Bazaar set out to create Hanukkah spirit through recycling gifts instead of buying and consuming new ones! Participants brought any and all of the presents they'd received and could never find a use for. They perused the IKAR Bazaar and bid on re-gifts in a silent auction. The proceeds from the auction went toward providing for IKAR's adopted family during the holidays.

The IKAR community came together on Thanksgiving morning for some learning and meal preparation. Everyone brought food and helped assemble over 100 meals (50 over our goal!) that were delivered to the Daybreak Center in Santa Monica, supporting women with mental illness struggling with homelessness and poverty. Find out more by clicking here!

As the humanitarian crisis in Darfur worsens, we came together as a community to take action to support the people of the region. We learned about our responsibility as Jews and as human beings to respond to this crisis, and hear from JWW (Jewish World Watch) representatives about the city-wide solar cooker campaign and educational toy lift. Following the learning, we collected and sorted toys for children in the Darfur refugee camps and made cards of support and encouragement to accompany the gifts.

Our first event was a picnic with members of Kinship in Action (KIA), an organization made up of families in South Los Angeles in which non-parental relatives, grandmothers and aunts, are raising the children of family members. KIA provides services and support for these care-givers and also helps them to advocate on their own behalf for changes in legislation that would support them as the state does with foster parents. Our event featured an education component first with just the IKAR folks, led by Rabbi Brous (for the adults) and Ayana Morse (for the kids) to help us think about the Jewish roots of social justice. After that, we joined by the KIA families and staff for a pot-luck picnic and games. We collected tzedakah to give the KIA kids a small gift of school supplies for the new school year.