Write On For Israel

Writing On For Israel (WOFI) is a zionist organization whose objective is to train American-Jewish High School students for two years to improve their Israel-advocacy effectiveness by improving their writing, journalism and communications skills. The program includes the following areas:

• The History of Israel
• Modern Jewish History
• Facts and Myths of the Current Conflict
• Recognizing and Countering Press Bias
• Meeting the Challenges on College Campuses

The WOFI students are prepared to engage in serious Israel-advocacy at their eventual universities and to join student newspapers. One can track the early WOFI graduates and determine that in fact most of them join the university newspapers.

About WOFI

From its website program description:

Write On For Israel is an intensive and exciting two-year program that trains a select group of high school students to become advocates for Israel through journalism. A project of the New York Jewish Week newspaper, Write On For Israel teaches students about Israel, Zionism and the Arab-Israeli conflict and empowers them to become effective advocates through writing, broadcasting and public speaking. Sessions focus on Jewish and Israel history and the facts and myths of the current conflict, as well as confronting press bias and making Israel's case to the media. The seminars are taught by top educators and professional journalists and feature appearances by Israeli officials, IDF officers, college students, PR executives and other top professionals.

Participants will be trained in:

• Journalistic writing
• Media relations
• Public speaking

When and Where Will the Program Take Place?

The seminars will be held on seven Sundays between November and June at the Kraft Jewish Center at Columbia University, culminating in a 10-day, free trip to Israel in early July, 2006.

Principals

• Linda Scherzer – Program Director
• Gary Rosenblatt – Founding Editor
• Yotav Eliach – Core Educator

WOFI Student Graduates

WOFI Students by year-pair
2002-2003	2003-2004	2004-2005
Arielle Anhalt	Sally Abadi	Daina Anhalt
Maxim Astashinsky	Rachel Bayefsky-Anand	Nina Anziska
Bella Ballas	Emily A. Belfer	Amanda Baskind
Leonid Begun	Aryeh Bernstein	Oren Benzaquen
Erica Belkin	Ben Decker	Jennifer Fishkin
James Bennet	Charles Harris	Adam Gindea
Nava Billet	Sippy Laster	Maya Glickman
Sara Bressler	Daniel Lubelskir	Jacob Greenberg
Boaz Cohen	Ora Z. Novick	Ari Heistein
Alan Feder	Amanda Pariser	Elah Lanis
Samantha Goldman	Yonatan Schenker	Eric Lemor
Daniel Goldmintz	Adeena Schlussel	Francesca Levine
Deena Greenberg	Emily Steinberger	Jeremy Miles
Chaim Gruschko	David Valiyev	Westleigh Nirenberg
Noam Harary	Jessica Weiner	Eitan Rapps
Melissa Hauptman		Avigayil Ribner
Rachel Klapper		Sam Safdieh
Noach Lerman		Anna Sce'
Elissa Lerner		Yedidya Schwartz
Daniel Loewenstein		Ido Shargal
Abigail Marcus		Lexi Shechtel
Shifra Mincer		Aviya Slutzky
Whitney Mosery		Zahava Stadler
Aryeh Roskies		Orah Weiss
Zachary Saltzman
Tamar Schimel
Danielle Slutzky
Jonathan D. Stettin
Rob Weisenfeld

Affiliations

• The Jewish Week (the largest Jewish newspaper in the US)
• Avi Chai Foundation

Contact

Website: www.writeonforisrael.org