Yachad has established a new summer partnership with Camp Moshava Wild Rose in Central Wisconsin. This is the first Yachad Summer Camp Program directly connecting the highly successful Chicago Yachad chapter with a camp valued throughout the greater Midwest and the rest of the country. It’s a synthesis of Yachad’s commitment to integration for campers with disabilities and one of the country’s most respected and loved summer camps.
Camp Moshava Wild Rose is a camp affiliated with Bnei Akiva, the religious Zionist youth movement. Yachad also partners with the other Bnei Akiva-affiliated sleepaway camps: Moshava IO, Moshava Ennismore, Camp Stone and Moshava California.
“Moshava Wild Rose has a long history of promoting inclusion in their camp,” said Joe Goldfarb, Ph.D., Director of Summer Programs at Yachad. “From day one we knew how critical this value was to them. We are absolutely thrilled to begin working together in educating the camp community and the Jewish community as a whole.”
Eli Jacobs, co-chair of Camp Moshava Wild Rose said, “we are extremely proud and excited about the opportunity to partner this summer with Yachad and Moshava Wild Rose. This will be an amazing experience for all of our campers.”
Camp Moshava Wild Rose will offer a camper integration program for the camp’s four-week and six-week sessions. Campers with special needs will be fully integrated into a typical bunk together with a supportive Yachad-trained counselor to facilitate and promote meaningful socialization and inclusion. The four-week camp runs from June 25 – July 23, 2018, and the six-week camp is from June 25 – August 6, 2018. The camp is open for boys or girls ages 9 – 15. Visit the camp website.
Yachad currently offers 26 different summer programs, and the Camp Moshava Wild Rose partnership is the 15th camp that Yachad will now be partnering with to promote inclusion and provide opportunities for campers with disabilities.
“The board is commited and excited to work together with Yachad to welcome the campers as part of the Moshava Wild Rose family,” said Josh Zwelling, Director of Camp Moshava Wild Rose, noting that inclusion is “such an important, integral part of who we are. There’s no greater organization than Yachad that does this type of work and we look forward to partnering with them for years to come.”
Registration for campers with special needs is open. Please contact Gayle Abrams, LMSW at abramsg@ou.org or 646-241-5099 for more information. Staff who want to work with campers with disabilities should apply here.
This article was written by Amy Lerner, Yachad Content Writer