Neve Sraya ( Brosh )
Art, Creation and Sustainability Village for Religious Teenage Boys at Risk
Neve Sraya is Timora’s creative solution for the phenomenon of 13-18 year old boys who have difficulty persevering in their regular schools, and need a framework that will prevent their dropping out and will give them a sense of confidence and stability.
Neve Sraya vreceives teenage boys with open arms and, with the help of art and ecology, helps them cope with a wide variety of their personal and social difficulties.
Life in the Village combines studies for a high school diploma, investment in art and creation, and physical work based on agriculture and the prevailing principles. Activities involving art and creative work relate to the teenagers’ emotional worlds, whereas their former schools didn’t give them an outlet for expression.
Neve Sraya is an educational, creative and rehabilitative model for teenage boys at risk who lack boundaries and a framework.
Neve Sraya, located in the Jordan Valley, offers a comprehensive residential school alignment and applies a dynamic educational process that brings the teenage boys back to their home communities as independent adults. Neve Sraya serves as an example of a supportive adult for its teenage students. The combination of studies for high school graduation along with work in art and agriculture gives the youngsters new means of expression and a chance for a normative life within the framework of friends and family. The village, which now accommodates around thirty teenagers, will grow in stages up to a maximum of 180 boys.
Art and agriculture as tools for self-expression
The teenagers can choose between the stage arts, drama and movement, and visual art, drawing, painting, sculpture, woodwork, metal work and cloth works. The physical work is in construction and agriculture, and its main purpose is to expose the youth to growth in all cycles of life. In the future we will examine the option of turning the agricultural work into a branch that will help to financially establish the Village and its residents.
Activities
Art and creation lessons as part of a timetable
Carpentry, building, drama, music, martial arts, drawing and painting, sustainability and creative writing.
The courses in the village are
- Art and Design
- Agriculture, with the belief that all teenage boys will find the profession that is closest to his heart
In the course of the year the teenagers attend
workshops, discussion groups, survival treks, meetings with artists, art days, meetings with national and world artists.
Building the Village is a significant part of the student’s sense of belonging to the place
Building the Village is a significant part of the student’s sense of belonging to the place
Neve Sraya's Graduates
“People are busy recycling, doing things again. People want to succeed like other people, get recognition like them. That is the power of routine, the norm that causes people to believe that they can achieve the same success as others. To recycle success is not easy, to forgo success is much more difficult. But to discover personal success? That is supreme success. That is Brosh.
First year graduate
10th grade graduate
11th grade graduate
11th grade graduate
“Hey, do you remember me? I look different, no? What’s this, I grew my hair, you ask? I can’t explain in words what happened to me, so at least I’ll try. Okay, I went through a year at Neve Sraya, and as far back as I can remember myself I never went through such an internal change. What’s so cool about it is that I made this change almost without any physical help from the staff. They just gave me the tools and let me “go on a quest.” A year when a child whose purpose in life is that it should be fun and funny transforms into a boy who searches for something a bit more. A boy who cares more and is more moral. Has more values. Is more idealistic. Gives more of himself. Is smarter. More of a friend. Mainly, more me! I am a person who can at long last look at what is happening to me. Maybe that’s because of the “over freedom” they give at Brosh. It’s really quite amazing. An example that most amazed me was once I would run from responsibility, always avoid lending a helping hand, and then of course I would give an excuse and act very childishly. And I would look at all those who do help and think it comes to them naturally. And now I arrived at a place where I can create a new name for myself. And people look at me and think that it comes to me naturally- very ironic! Another thing that happened to me was that I always had a certain charisma, but it was always more comfortable for me to take it to the place of the funny boy! And this year I made a switch in my head and the situation changed. Okay, I’m not going to explain the change that has come over me now, so I simply won’t do that because it is mine and doesn’t belong to anyone else.”