This following interview has been edited lightly for clarity and brevity.

Jewish Educational Leadership: Many of our readers are familiar with what a shinshin is, but not all. Can you tell us briefly?

Shira Rafalovitz: Sure. Shinshin is short for shenat sherut, a year of service. It is a year of volunteer work that some Israelis do before they start the army. Most people do their sherut in Israel, volunteering in lots of different places, but some of us choose to go overseas to work in schools or Jewish communities where we think that we can help build bridges between Jewish communities around the world and Israel. I got placed in Detroit, where I did most of my work at Frankel Jewish Academy, the high school. I also did some teaching in a Sunday school with younger kids and with a synagogue.

Were you there alone?

No, there were five of us in total in Detroit. Three went to other places, but I and one other guy were together.

What was the nature of your being there? What was the scope of your responsibilities?

So, I’m going to talk mainly about the high school, since that took up most of our time. In the synagogue and the Sunday school we did mostly teaching. In the high school, our main job was to connect with the teens in the school, to give them a real connection with Israelis and a reason to love Israel and to want to be in Israel.

How did you do that?

First, we would go into the Hebrew classes and do different activities about Israel, and we’d do Hebrew games and activities. That was how we got to meet many of the kids. But probably the most important thing was that we had our office, and people were allowed—encouraged—to come when they had a free period and just sit and hang out. That talking really provided a way for them to connect and hear from Israeli teens what life is like in Israel. You know, we were only a year older than the twelfth graders, so it was like a teen-to-teen experience. If you were to ask shinshinim who were in the elementary school, their job was much more about the actual activities that they helped to run, but for us, we saw a really big part in the informal part.

When you reflect on what you did there, which part do you think really impacted most on the students or on the school?

The one that always comes to mind first is those personal connections, they really made a big difference. Because we were with older kids and were able to talk about the more complex things. It was different from the classic, what you learn in Jewish school about Israel; we really had a chance to share our experiences. We were there during the second year of the war with Hamas. There was this one time—and I don’t remember exactly what was happening in Israel, but Israel was all over the news—and this 12^th grader, who was just a year younger than us, he came into our office, and he said, “I heard this is what’s going on, and I want to hear from you guys, from the Israelis, who know and have experience with what’s going on. What does this mean for us and for Israel?” That was an example of a conversation which felt like we were really having an impact, that we had really accomplished something because we were able to talk things through and he was able to get a perspective that was very different from what he was hearing in the media.

There were times when we felt that we were opening lines of real communication. For example, we would have people coming into our office and just sit down to talk. Some of them came to watch Fauda with us. We helped them understand what was going on and they learned a lot about Israel’s culture and Shabak (Israel’s security service) and all kinds of things that you wouldn’t necessarily learn in a classroom.

One of the things we really wanted to accomplish was showing them that if they met Israelis teens it won’t be so different—they’ll know what they do, they’ll know the games they play, they’ll feel comfortable with them.

That doesn’t mean that we didn’t do any teaching. We were very involved in things like Hebrew Language Day, but it was the informal talking where we really felt like we were making a difference.

It was interesting, because I’m from a kibbutz and the guy who was with me is from a city in the center, so we were coming from different experiences and different cultures, and the kids had a chance to get to know us both and see different perspectives on what it means to be Israeli.

Let’s talk about the other teachers in the school. What kinds of interactions did you have with them? Were they helpful? Did you feel like the teachers welcomed you and appreciated what you were doing? Did they invite you into their classes?

We had great experiences with both the Hebrew-Judaics teachers and the other teachers in the school, but they were definitely different experiences. With the Hebrew and Judaics teachers, they would invite us into their classes and we’d be involved. If students needed help, we were able to help and we did projects with the students. I think that some students actually learned to like Israel more because of that.

When it came to the other teachers, we really enjoyed talking to them or joining the clubs they ran during lunch, sometimes we even joined their classes, like a computer science class. I actually think that we had really great connections with those teachers and that we had an impact on the way they viewed Israel. Many of them had not really met Israelis, some weren’t Jewish and didn’t necessarily know that much, so us being there and talking to them helped them understand better as well.

So, you spoke about the individual students, and even the teachers. Do you think you had an impact on the school or was that not part of what you were there for?

It’s hard to say if we did or not, but I think we did. We had a big part in the different kinds of programs in the school. For example, there was a town hall every week, and we were involved. Certainly for the different ceremonies, for Yom HaShoah, Yom Hazikaron, we played a big part. Look, as a shinshin, part of the job is to connect people to Israel. So, for Yom HaAtzma’ut, we were in charge of the program for the whole school; some of the other holidays, we were in charge of. And we brought Israel into all of it, to really encourage people to want to come to Israel. We were the living Israel that you could see walking down the hallways.

You were there during the second year of the Gaza war. Did that come up a lot?

Definitely. A lot. Especially in the town halls. We had lots of opportunities to make announcements in the town halls and there was always room for us to talk about what’s been going on. We would also talk about it in the classes.

What do you think this school did that was really good in terms of helping you to be successful?

I think that they let us show what we have to show, and that they encouraged us to be a main part of the school. I wouldn’t say that all shinshinim have the same experience, but we were very relevant in the school, and I think that that’s what allowed us to be as impactful as we were. In some places, the shinshinim do a lot of activities but they’re not really a part of the school. That was definitely not the case for us, and I think that that’s what really helped us. We really did feel it. We felt both part of the staff and part of the students, and that’s why we felt like we could reach our potential. We really could talk to anyone.

Can you give some specific examples of what the school did to make you feel like you were really relevant and really important and part of the staff?

First of all, on any holiday, we were part of the holiday committee, and we were sort of like students and sort of like staff. We were considered staff a lot of the times, but we were young staff, so we could also be more hands-on with the students. A lot of the organizing fell on our shoulders; the staff organizing the committee would first come to us, and they would say, “We know you guys do it best, so what is it that you can do to make this the best way to bring the holiday to the school. And anything that had to do with Israel, us with our supervisor, we were the ones planning it.

You mentioned a supervisor. Was this a teacher, an administrator?

She was a teacher, the head of the Hebrew department. She’s an Israeli who has been living in Michigan for a long time and she was directly responsible for us.

Did the things that you did revolve around Hebrew language, or was it mostly about bringing the voice of Israel and the culture of Israel into the school?

We certainly were involved in Hebrew language, and that was more in the classes. Most of the formal work we did was in Hebrew classes—activities that had to do with teaching Hebrew and having to do with what they’re studying in Hebrew class.

Truth is, when students came into our office to hang out, we made sure, to whatever extent possible, to speak in Hebrew. It was a great opportunity to improve and strengthen their Hebrew and gave part of the flavor. Of course, a lot depended on the Hebrew level of the students, and we adjusted for different kids so that they could have conversations with us. So, the novice students got a different Hebrew level of response than the advanced ones.

If you would be contacted by a different school, or even Frankel, and they asked you what you could recommend to make the shinshin experience even more effective for the school, what would you say?

Look, I think that Frankel did a great job in making the shinshinim and Israel relevant through us. To any school I would say to involve the shinshinim in as much as possible, in anything you can think of. For example, we went to every Shabbaton the school had and were involved in the activities. We went on school trips. And I just wish that we could have had more opportunities. More is better. The biggest contribution we could make is building connections with the students, so the more opportunities for connecting the better.

Is there anything that you want to add?

I suspect that most shinshinim are working in elementary schools. That’s great, but there is so much that can be done with high school students. Because they’re older, they can engage in more serious and more complex kinds of discussions, and having older peers around for that is so important. It can build stronger connections with Israel and improve their Hebrew on the way.

I just, I really think that this program is really worth it for schools.