Since 2018, Wise School has brought the ShinShinim program to our community. This program is a partnership between the Jewish Federation of Greater Los Angeles and the Jewish Agency for Israel. The ShinShinim program seeks to connect people to contemporary Israeli life and culture by bringing post-high school adults for a year of service to the Jewish communities outside of Israel. ShinShinim is a Hebrew acronym for “Shnat Sheirut” – a year of service. Here at Wise, we refer to the young Israeli adult with the title “Shaliach” – emissary. We have been blessed to spend a year each with Shaliach Roy, Shaliach Stav, Shaliach Rom, Shlicha Oriel, Shlicha Gabi, and Shlicha Yael.

The program recruits the best of Israel’s young leaders. They are carefully chosen from hundreds of applicants after a lengthy and thorough selection process which evaluates candidates’ personality traits, creativity, interpersonal skills, knowledge of Israeli culture, fluency in English, and much more. Those selected as emissaries are trained in Israel through a preparatory course focusing on Jewish heritage, values and ways of life. The Service Year emissary is entirely devoted towards volunteer work in our community. 

Each Shaliach spends their days here on our campus working directly with students and teachers in classrooms and about campus. Some examples of their meaningful activities include:

• Creating experiential learning around key Israeli historical dates (i.e. Yom HaShoah, Yom Ha’Atzmaut or Tu B’Shvat)
• Designing and implementing units of study for both Hebrew and Judaic Studies classes involving everything from the music, to the art, to the politics of Israel
• Outdoor Israeli games
• Socializing with and mentoring Wise students during recess and lunch

Our Shlichim stay with host families from our Wise community.