Earlier this month, 15 high school students from northern New Jersey traveled to Puerto Rico on a two-day NCSY relief mission to help with cleanup for flooding caused by Hurricane Fiona in September and to distribute supplies to local schools. Participants came from Tenafly High, East Brunswick High, Bergen Academies, Ridgewood High, Glen Rock High, Fair Lawn High and Livingston High.
NCSY, part of the Orthodox Union, is a youth group that provides Jewish teens with innovative social and recreational programs so they develop a positive Jewish identity. The NCSY Relief Missions division sends Jewish teens across America and internationally to help with damage after a natural disaster strikes. Since 2005, NCSY has sent more than 2,000 student volunteers to disaster-stricken areas in Puerto Rico, Minnesota, North Carolina, Texas, and other locations. NCSY runs an average of 45-50 relief missions per year, totaling 190 missions in the past 17 years. The Puerto Rico visit took place Nov 10-11.
Urban Edge Properties, a New York-based real estate investment firm, partnered with NCSY as part of its ESG (environmental, social and governance) investing division. ESG is the practice of donating to and otherwise supporting environmental and social causes. In addition to employees from Urban Edge’s New York office helping with the cleanup, the company used two of the shopping malls it owns in Puerto Rico as base camps to collect and distribute supplies for local schools.
