One of TEJA's main goals is to raise funds to contribute to our initiatives. While listed below are a number of suggestions for how this can be done in your community, we are open to hearing other ideas.
Bake Sale
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Pretty self-explanatory: get a bunch of volunteers to bake cookies, cupcakes, etc. Potentially decorate with Ethiopia themed icing (using the colors red, yellow, green). Make sure to put up flyers and get people interested.
Parlor Meetings
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What this means is you arrange for someone to host a brunch/dinner (paid for by us), where adults come and listen to a speaker (which we can certainly help arrange). After the speaker is finished speaking, an appeal for donations will be made to the attendees. This one involves a lot of organizing and bugging parents throughout the community. It might be a good idea to send out email invitations in your community and then tell kids to bother their parents to consider going.
3-on-3 Basketball Tournaments.
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For larger communities, throw a 3-on-3 basketball tournament. Charge a small amount per team. The grand prize for the winning team can be some of the money, but the prize can be anything you think people will find meaningful. If you're interested, TEJ can supply some interesting things from Ethiopia as prizes, like hand-made Teffillin bags, sculpures, etc. While it sounds weird at first, a little enthusiasm will get people interested and talking about it.
Donations
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Soliciting funds from your local Jewish Federation for humanitarian assistance in Ethiopia. Local Federations may be responsive to requests from your Rabbi or from you directly.