Leon and Toby Cooperman and their family, including son Wayne and daughter-in-law, Jodi, have committed $5 million to create a permanent fund in MetroWest NJ to support Jewish camp, Birthright Israel, and other programs to enhance Jewish continuity among young people in this community and the region.

The Cooperman family is the first in the nation to create a significant permanent endowment in support of Birthright Israel, considered one of the most successful Jewish identity programs in modern Jewish history. As a result, MetroWest will have the first endowed “Birthright Israel Bus,” through creating permanent support for at least one tour group per year for young Jewish adults from MetroWest and across New Jersey.

The Cooperman gift comes as the MetroWest community is also launching one of the most ambitious programs in the nation to promote Jewish overnight camp, with the goal of doubling the number of local Jewish children who attend such camps over five years.

Through the “MetroWest Jewish Camp Enterprise,” the community will be offering $1 million in campership grants—of $1,000 per child--to families in MetroWest who send a child to Jewish overnight camp for the first time. The grants are being offered over the next five years, beginning with the summer of 2010.

The MetroWest Jewish Camp Enterprise is being funded by $2 million in support from private donors: the Paula and Jerry Gottesman Family Supporting Foundation of Jewish Community Foundation of MetroWest, the Foundation for Jewish Camp, Archie Gottesman and Gary DeBode and Rob and Elisa Spungen Bildner.
The MetroWest Jewish Camp Enterprise is co-chaired by Rob and Elisa Spungen Bildner of Montclair as well as Archie Gottesman and Gary DeBode of Summit.
The Bildners are founders of the national FJC and are credited with helping to elevate Jewish camps—long considered an undervalued resource—to become one of national Jewish community’s top priorities.

The Cooperman endowment fund will provide long-term support for the Jewish Camp Enterprise, helping to sustain this programming into the future. The MetroWest camp initiative is one of the most comprehensive and innovative such programs in the nation, according to the FJC, which is a partner in the MetroWest program and helped to develop it.

The Cooperman Family Fund for a Jewish Future will be held by the Jewish Community Foundation of MetroWest NJ, the planned giving and endowment arm of United Jewish Communities of MetroWest NJ. The Cooperman Family Fund for a Jewish Future will help to form the foundation of a new major endeavor to build permanent funding for vital programs and agencies in MetroWest and beyond that help secure a Jewish future, according to Max L. Kleinman, executive vice president of UJC MetroWest.

The Coopermans say they are motivated to establish this fund through seeing the impact that Birthright Israel and Jewish camping have on young people. Recent research has found that Birthright Israel can have a major impact on the Jewish identity and practices of young people.

The Coopermans are members of Areivim, a national group of philanthropists headed by Michael Steinhardt, the former hedge fund manager turned philanthropist who co-founded Birthright Israel and has spearheaded many Jewish identity programs through his Steinhardt Foundation for Jewish Life. The Cooperman Family Fund for a Jewish Future is part of a national legacy project sponsored by Areivim.

Leon and Toby Cooperman are long-time community leaders and major philanthropists in the MetroWest community and beyond. Leon Cooperman, a former Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of the Asset Management division of Goldman, Sachs & Co., is the founder of Omega Advisors, Inc., a New York-based hedge fund.

The Bildners are founders of the national FJC and are credited with helping to elevate Jewish camps—long considered an undervalued resource—to become one of national Jewish community’s top priorities. The FJC has become one of the most respected, and best funded, Jewish organizations in the nation. Archie Gottesman is a board member of Camp JRF, where her children attend camp. Camp JRF is the national camp of the Reconstructionist movement.

The MetroWest Jewish Camp Enterprise is housed at The Partnership for Jewish Learning and Life, UJC MetroWest’s Jewish identity agency. The Jewish Community Foundation of MetroWest NJ is coordinating fundraising for the initiative. In MetroWest, an estimated 1,000 youngsters attend Jewish overnight camp; the MetroWest Jewish Camp Enterprise seeks to double the number to 2,000 youngsters by 2015.

Research indicates that youngsters immersed in the “24/7” experience of residential Jewish camp are significantly more likely than non-campers to grow into Jewish adults who have a strong, well-developed Jewish identity, affiliate with Jewish organizations and practice Judaism actively, and feel a strong attachment to the State of Israel.