Excerpt of opinion article written by Rabbi Dr. Morey Schwartz, Melton's International Director, for ejewishphilanthropy.com.

As we mark Jewish Disabilities Awareness, Acceptance and Inclusion Month (JDAIM) this February, we must ask a more challenging question: Once everyone is in the room, is the wisdom within that room truly accessible to them?

If our mission is to ensure that Jewish life belongs to every Jew, then we must move beyond physical access toward intellectual equity. This means recognizing that a deep, sophisticated connection to Jewish text and tradition is not a luxury for the neurotypical, but a birthright for every adult, including those with intellectual and developmental disabilities (I/DD).

At the Florence Melton School of Adult Jewish Learning, our decades-long mission has been built on the premise that Jewish literacy is the bedrock of Jewish identity, and that making that learning accessible is a foundational aspect of our mission.

In the world of adult education, there is often a quiet, unintentional bias suggesting that in order to make Judaism accessible to individuals with I/DD, “simplified” versions of Judaism are required, often reverting to stories or concepts typically reserved for children. However, when we at Melton began the journey to develop the What’s Mine is Yours (WMIY) curriculum, we decided that “accessibility” does not mean “simplicity.” It means “intentionality.”

Creating an adapted curriculum in partnership with Matan was more than a technical project; it was a labor of love rooted in the belief that the “living wisdom” we teach is universal. The challenge wasn’t to change the essence of the Torah, but to rethink the delivery.

Read the full article here.

Rabbi Dr. Morey Schwartz, EdD, is the International Director of the Florence Melton School of Adult Jewish Learning.