• About
  • Support AJW
  • Jewish Community Directory
  • Subscription Information
  • Contact Us
American Jewish World
No Result
View All Result
  • News
    • All
    • Africa
    • Asia
    • Australia & New Zealand
    • Europe
    • Israel/Mideast
    • Latin America
    • Minnesota
    • US & Canada
    On trumpet, Frank London

    On trumpet, Frank London

    Editorial: In the ghetto

    Editorial: In the ghetto

    Natalie Fine Shapiro’s artworks bring the colors of spring

    Natalie Fine Shapiro’s artworks bring the colors of spring

  • Arts
    • All
    • Blue Box
    • Books & Literature
    • Music
    • Televison & Film
    • Theater & Performing Arts
    • Visual Arts
    A wedding in Hebron gets complicated

    A wedding in Hebron gets complicated

    On trumpet, Frank London

    On trumpet, Frank London

    Surviving the hell of death camps

    Surviving the hell of death camps

  • Lifestyle
    • All
    • Fashion
    • Food
    • Health & Wellness
    • Home & Garden
    • Travel & Culture
    Jewish Cubans survive the island’s economic collapse

    Jewish Cubans survive the island’s economic collapse

    My time with the Greek Jewish community

    My time with the Greek Jewish community

    Tracing family roots in Germany

    Tracing family roots in Germany

  • Editorial
  • Opinion
  • AJW Digital Archives
  • News
    • All
    • Africa
    • Asia
    • Australia & New Zealand
    • Europe
    • Israel/Mideast
    • Latin America
    • Minnesota
    • US & Canada
    On trumpet, Frank London

    On trumpet, Frank London

    Editorial: In the ghetto

    Editorial: In the ghetto

    Natalie Fine Shapiro’s artworks bring the colors of spring

    Natalie Fine Shapiro’s artworks bring the colors of spring

  • Arts
    • All
    • Blue Box
    • Books & Literature
    • Music
    • Televison & Film
    • Theater & Performing Arts
    • Visual Arts
    A wedding in Hebron gets complicated

    A wedding in Hebron gets complicated

    On trumpet, Frank London

    On trumpet, Frank London

    Surviving the hell of death camps

    Surviving the hell of death camps

  • Lifestyle
    • All
    • Fashion
    • Food
    • Health & Wellness
    • Home & Garden
    • Travel & Culture
    Jewish Cubans survive the island’s economic collapse

    Jewish Cubans survive the island’s economic collapse

    My time with the Greek Jewish community

    My time with the Greek Jewish community

    Tracing family roots in Germany

    Tracing family roots in Germany

  • Editorial
  • Opinion
  • AJW Digital Archives
No Result
View All Result
Morning News
No Result
View All Result
Home Opinion

Sharing Israel’s green-conscious values

American Jewish World by American Jewish World
May 23, 2020
in Opinion
0
Share on FacebookShare on Twitter

Experience gained as a green apprentice at Kibbutz Lotan is now applied to eco-projects in low-income areas of Minneapolis

By JOSH TOLKAN

After graduating from Carleton College in Northfield, Minn., with a concentration in environmental and technology studies, I was interested in gaining hands-on ecological experience and seeing Israel. On Kibbutz Lotan’s Green Apprenticeship program, I was able to explore the fields of permaculture and natural building.

My Lotan experience was sponsored in part through MASA Israel Journey, a joint project of the Israeli government and the Jewish Agency for Israel. The program enables young adults to spend time in Israel interning, volunteering or studying. (MASA has many programs, so check them out — if Kibbutz Lotan isn’t right for you, another one will be.) While I always had a strong interest in the environment and served as the nature counselor at a day camp during summer breaks from college, Kibbutz Lotan gave me the tools and vision to lead an environmentally conscious life. On the green apprenticeship, I led a truly inspired life for 10 long weeks.

READ ALSO

Advice to Israel from this happy land

Dayenu

The team of green apprentices would pick vegetables from the garden and use them in homemade breakfasts with hot, homemade pita bread cooked on an earthen hearth. The entire team of nine lived life communally — experience that taught us all important life lessons in teamwork and interpersonal relations.

Our training included practice building unique gardens that employed various composting strategies and planting techniques. We also practiced natural building techniques while constructing straw bale- and mud plaster-covered geodesic domes as well as other structures around the kibbutz. A few other apprentices and I also built a sunflower-shaped bench solely from used material, including old tires and plastic bins.

The most important lesson I gleaned from my experience was probably the simplest one: encourage people, especially children, to connect with the earth. In order to craft a population that cares about the environment, children must have the experience of putting their hands in the earth — planting a seed and watching it become a plant.

Upon my return, I took this lesson with me in my work at JCC Rainbow Day Camp (RDC) in Fredonia, Wisc., where I had worked as the “Nature Guy” for three summers in high school and college. Upon returning to RDC, I decided to go beyond nature lessons and bring some Israeli flavor to the camp, encouraging the kids to get their hands dirty. I started Kibbutz Keshet and worked with the campers to plant a garden, build an earth oven and do team building activities relating to kibbutz life.

Recently, I started volunteering for a program through Project for Pride in Living in Minneapolis called Roots and Reading, which combined reading and gardening for children from low-income families.

I recently received my master’s degree in urban planning with a certificate in metropolitan design from the University of Minnesota. Volunteering in the Roots and Reading program led to an AmeriCorps job at Project for Pride in Living (PPL), a nonprofit that builds low-income housing and fights poverty throughout the Twin Cities. There, I work on a variety of projects, including home repair programs and several landscaping initiatives, such as redesigning poorly engineered storm water ponds.

I am also involved in PPL’s Hawthorne EcoVillage development in North Minneapolis, an area of the Hawthorne Neighborhood that is stricken with foreclosed vacant homes. PPL will completely redevelop four square blocks with a variety of environmentally friendly housing types. There will be community gardens and low impact landscaping featuring native plants. The entire development will be certified with LEED for Neighborhood Development through the U.S. Green Building Council.

Though I had not expected to find such a green-conscious community in the small country, its presence in Israel soon made sense to me. As tikkun olam, or seeking to repair the world, is a core Jewish value, environmental awareness should be a central part of Judaism. In everything I do, I try to remember the values I gained on Kibbutz Lotan and incorporate them into my life.

***

Josh Tolkan lives in Minneapolis.

Related Posts

Advice to Israel from this happy land
Opinion

Advice to Israel from this happy land

January 19, 2025
Dayenu
Opinion

Dayenu

April 5, 2024
Letter to my Israeli children
Opinion

Letter to my Israeli children

March 20, 2024
Cancel Purim in 2024
Opinion

Cancel Purim in 2024

March 8, 2024
Israel’s Lincoln moment
Opinion

Israel’s Lincoln moment

February 19, 2024
Two op-eds display a widening schism over Israel
Opinion

Two op-eds display a widening schism over Israel

December 4, 2023
Next Post

Sholem Aleichem translator to speak

Comments 0

  1. Stuart Zemel says:
    15 years ago

    Dear Josh,
    This is fantastic. I really enjoyed the article. Even better than the article is your actual work. Thank you for helping me remain optimistic for the future of our world. Believe it or not I believe things are improving world wide each and every day.
    You cousin,
    Stuart Zemel

    Reply
  2. Pingback: Sharing Israel’s green-conscious values | kibbutzlotan.com

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

RECENT ARTICLES

A wedding in Hebron gets complicated

A wedding in Hebron gets complicated

May 21, 2025
Editorial: Repression in the guise of fighting antisemitism

Editorial: Repression in the guise of fighting antisemitism

May 20, 2025
On trumpet, Frank London

On trumpet, Frank London

May 19, 2025
Editorial: In the ghetto

Editorial: In the ghetto

April 21, 2025
Surviving the hell of death camps

Surviving the hell of death camps

April 20, 2025

About

Since 1912 the AJW has served as an important news resource for the Jewish community. The Jewish World unites the main Jewish communities in St. Paul and Minneapolis, as well as those in Duluth, Rochester and smaller cities, and bridges the divides between the various Jewish religious streams.

Quick Links

  • About the AJW
  • Advertising Information
  • Submission Guidelines
  • Subscription Information
  • Jewish Community Directory

Contact Us

The American Jewish World
3249 Hennepin Ave., Suite 245
Minneapolis, MN 55408

Tel: 612.824.0030 / Fax: 612.823.0753
editor@ajwnews.com

  • Buy JNews
  • Landing Page
  • Documentation
  • Support Forum

© 2025 JNews - Premium WordPress news & magazine theme by Jegtheme.

No Result
View All Result
  • Home
  • News
  • Food
  • Health & Wellness
  • Lifestyle
  • Opinion
  • About the AJW
  • Jewish Community Directory
  • Support AJW
  • Subscription Information
  • Contact Us

© 2025 JNews - Premium WordPress news & magazine theme by Jegtheme.