September 7, 2005

Putting the “Wow!” Back into Judaism
New NCSY National Director, Rabbi Steven Burg, Brings his Passion for Judaism to Yeshiva and Public School Teens Coast to Coast

“It’s all about passion,” says Rabbi Steven Burg, new National Director of the OU’s National Conference of Synagogue Youth (NCSY). “We’re teaching Jewish teenagers that they can feel excited about being Jewish. NCSY provides an environment where it is and cool for a Jewish teen to recite a Dvar Torah.”

Rabbi Burg says he plans to drive that passion across the country, cranking up the program’s efforts to inspire more and more teenagers from already observant homes and the many more from unaffiliated families by doing what NCSY does best – sparking the love of Judaism through informal education and a whole lot of fun.

After five outstanding years as Director of NCSY’s West Coast Region, based in Los Angeles, and before that, four years as Associate Regional Director in Detroit, Rabbi Burg has moved back to his native coast to assume NCSY’s National Directorship. And the OU is delighted he did. “Steve Burg has demonstrated that he has the vision, the skills, and the energy to become the National Director of NCSY,” declared OU President, Stephen J. Savitsky. “Along with his ability to create excitement in Jewish youth, he possesses the creative competence to deal with the major issues facing NCSY.”

In just two years under his leadership, NCSY in Los Angeles went from 175 participants at its regional convention to 425 – attracting both yeshiva/day school students and teens from the public schools. Rabbi Burg attributes this phenomenal draw to a “very good staff” and quality programming every night of the week. Heading this stellar staff was Rabbi Burg himself.

“He is a star in Jewish outreach,” said Martin Nachimson, National Chairman of the OU Youth Commission, who worked closely with Rabbi Burg in Los Angeles. “It’s rare that you find someone with the combination of such strong interpersonal, programmatic, and administrative abilities. Steve is held in high regard by his contemporaries. This promotion to National Director is evidence of the OU’s confident vision of the significant role he will play in the future of kiruv (Jewish outreach).”

Reaching Teens Where they Live

Now that he’s back in New York, Rabbi Burg will focus as he did in Los Angeles on reaching out to, not just yeshiva/day school students and Jewishly identified public school teens, but also to unaffiliated Jewish youth. In a clear demonstration of Rabbi Burg’s genius for kiruv, this tireless youth leader took his “Jewish passion” into the Los Angeles public schools to reach the teens NCSY normally doesn’t attract – thousands of unaffiliated youngsters, completely oblivious to their heritage. After meeting with a group of public school teens and learning how much they were thirsting for a Jewish experience, Rabbi Burg decided to initiate Jewish clubs in Southern California’s secular high schools and opened the first one in 2002.

“Every day missionaries are targeting unaffiliated Jewish teens,” says Rabbi Burg. “It’s critical that we provide these young people with some sort of Jewish education.” Without delay, he therefore, founded the Jewish Student Union (JSU), opening club after club in prestigious high schools, offering free pizza and a relaxed, non-threatening environment for teens to shmooze about being Jewish. The Los Angeles area now boasts 17 JSU clubs and a lot more happily identified Jewish teenagers. Under Rabbi Burg’s leadership, the clubs are rapidly dotting the nation’s map, currently numbering 150, with thousands of teens enthusiastically participating each week in public and private secular high schools.

If Rabbi Burg has anything to do with it – and he does – NCSY will continue to be an inspirational household word in more and more Jewish homes across North America. “Twenty years ago, many yeshiva/ day schools gave us a hard time about Shabbatonim,” says Rabbi Burg, referring to the extended (weekend-long) Shabbat experience that NCSY pioneered. “They responded with skepticism to the students having to miss Friday classes. Today there is not a Jewish high school out there that doesn’t run its own Shabbaton. That’s NCSY’s influence and we have to continue to be innovative about our programming.”

Currently, NCSY runs scores of highly successful events, such as “Latte and Learning” (initiated by Rabbi Burg in Detroit), teaching teens Torah in Starbucks and other coffee houses. “We have to understand exactly where teenagers are and appeal to them,” explains Rabbi Burg. “Torah doesn’t change but the marketing does and it’s extremely critical. We have to ask, where does our youth want to be; what do they want to do?”

The son of Rabbi Melvin Burg of Pri Eitz Chaim Ocean Avenue Jewish Congregation, an OU member synagogue, Rabbi Burg learned early on the positive effect an individual can have on the community. At 19, he discovered his community calling. At a friend’s suggestion, he attended his first NCSY Shabbaton in Pittsburgh in 1991. “One Shabbaton and that was it. I fell instantly in love with the experiential education, the music, dancing, and incredible ruach (spirit),” says Rabbi Burg. “I decided then and there I wanted to become an NCSY Regional Director. I saw this as the best position to influence the greatest amount of teens. It’s the surefire way to their hearts.” He promptly got involved in NCSY’s Central East Region, which includes Michigan, Ohio and Pennsylvania, and hasn’t left the program since.

“Rabbi Burg is a consummate professional who has come up through the ranks of NCSY,” says Rabbi Moshe Krupka, OU’s National Executive Director. “He’s a man who cares deeply about the Jewish people and the future of Am Yisrael.” According to Rabbi Krupka, throughout Rabbi Burg’s decade and a half of working for NCSY he has proven himself to be an outstanding youth professional and educator. “With his energy, talent and compelling enthusiasm for Torah, Rabbi Burg is capable of motivating and inspiring tens of thousands of teenagers to rededicate themselves to a life of Torah and mitzvot.”

Taking Jewish Passion Across the Map

“What we accomplished on the West Coast serves as a model of what we can accomplish throughout North America,” says Rabbi Burg. He views his position as National Director as the optimal vehicle to bring the excitement of Judaism to thousands more teens across the country. He’s communicating with the Regional Directors to discuss objectives and tactics, and is planning to hold quarterly meetings to share ideas and to evaluate if everyone is reaching their goals. Rabbi Burg makes regular visits to NCSY sites with his “national team,” David Frankel, Associate National Director, and Ronit Meitlis-Hofer, Associate Director of Strategic Planning and Special Events.

“Until now, the program has been very region-specific,” Rabbi Burg says. “My goal is to create one bold organization.” This August, one hundred NCSY staff and ninety teens convened at an NCSY conference in Waterbury, CT, to discuss where the program is going and how they can help each other reach more spiritually disenfranchised Jewish youth.

“We have to take advantage of the web,” emphasizes Rabbi Burg. “Every teen has a PC or an iPod. We have to be available to them, because if they are not coming to us, they’re going elsewhere.” He’s speaking about the observant as well as the unaffiliated teen. “The reason why today’s youth doesn’t see Shabbos as a ‘Wow!’ experience is they just don’t get it; it was never really explained,” he says. “The same goes for tefillah (prayer). I tell them that instead of seeing it as just saying some words one doesn’t understand, it can be a very personal moment of reaching out to God, communicating with Him – confiding in Him. We aren’t supposed to be lonely in this world. God is supposed to be there for you.” Rabbi Burg says he doesn’t emphasize how many mitzvot an NCSYer keeps. “What makes the difference is how he keeps them.”

This difference is played out most poignantly when NCSY day school students meet their public school counterparts to learn together. “The yeshiva teens are pleasantly surprised to find out how much they, themselves, know by serving as mentors to the public school students who, in turn, gain tremendously from having peer role models imparting knowledge of a shared heritage,” Rabbi Burgs says. One group comes to NCSY with the knowledge; the other brings a yearning heart, and together, with the help of a dynamic National Director, they form many passionate neshamot (Jewish souls).

Rabbi Steven Burg

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The Orthodox Union, now in its second century of service to the Jewish community of North America and beyond, is a world leader in community and synagogue services, adult education, youth work through NCSY, political action through the IPA, and advocacy for persons with disabilities through Yachad and Our Way. Its kosher supervision label, the , is the world’s most recognized kosher symbol and can be found on over 409,000 products manufactured in 83 countries around the globe.

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