Paideia’s alumni body comprises of hundreds of program graduates in over 40 different countries. They are community professionals and cultural producers, heads of educational institutions and editors, rabbis in nine different countries, cantors and researchers, museum professionals and artists, journalists and authors. They form part of an active, and growing, community of mutual support and joint action. They are united in their motivation and willingness to contribute to the renewal of Jewish culture in Europe.
Paideia supports its alumni on an individual basis with recommendations, connections, networking, and opportunities and has initiated a number of different programmatic measures for supporting the alumni, in close cooperation and consultation with the graduates themselves. Alumni activities include the yearly alumni conference, a micro-grant scheme, the HUB – online learning sessions for alumni clusters around Europe, an interactive database and much more.
Alumni Conferences
The conference is organized annually in various European places, allowing Paideia
alums to know many European Jewish communities and centres.
Diane and Howard Wohl generously sponsor the Paideia Alumni Conference, making this annual forum for the Paideia community.
The tradition of the conference started with the less formal gatherings of the first
year’s alumni, revealing the will and need of further contacts, networking and cooperation.
And this is how the tradition was born. Spring 2005 saw the first official Paideia Alumni
Conference, held in Stockholm. Since then, various places all over Europe became the
meeting place, creating sense of community, building the networking, space for sharing the
knowledge and skills, and generate new initiatives and cooperation opportunities.
Previous alumni meetings have been held in:
- 2005 Stockholm 1st Alumni Conference
- 2006 Olomouc 2nd Alumni Conference
- 2008 Kraków 3rd Alumni Conference
- 2009 Budapest 4th Alumni Conference
- 2010 Kiev 5th Alumni Conference
- 2011 Uppsala 6th Alumni Conference
- 2012 Heidelberg 7th Alumni Conference
- 2013 Toledo 8th Alumni Conference
- 2014 Venice 9th Alumni Conference
- 2015 Prague 10th Alumni Conference
- 2016 Warsaw 11th Alumni Conference
- 2017 Berlin 12th Alumni Conference
- 2018 Barcelona 13th Alumni Conference
- 2019 Vienna 14th Alumni Conference
- 2020 Online Conference, Stockholm-based 15th Alumni Conference
- 2021 Online Conference, Stockholm-based 16th Alumni Conference
- 2022 Amsterdam 17th Alumni Conference
- 2023 18th Alumni Conference
Paideia Mifgash
Paideia Mifgash is a series of pop-up events that take place all over Europe.
The project is dedicated to strengthening the presence of Jewish thought and culture in all its aspects, to building bridges and to the exchange of ideas at the local and Pan-European level. Mifgash aims to promote the diversity of Jewish life and to encourage and empower Paideia Alumni to grow as local activists.
In 2023, Paideia Mifgash was organized in 12 different locations and gathered more than 400 participants.
All Mifgash events are built around one common theme that serves as inspiration.
The 2024 Paideia Mifgash theme is Relations: family and beyond.
Paideia Mifgash has been strengthened by the collaboration with the National Library of Israel and the European Association for the Preservation and Promotion of Jewish Culture and Heritage (AEPJ).