NCSY. Vancouver (Canada)

Rabbi Samuel Ross was the founding member of both the Berlin and Calgary kollels. In Berlin Rabbi Ross focused on developing student and teen programs and Shabbatons.

In Calgary, Rabbi Ross together with his wife Gila launched programs for kids, teens and students. Attendances for these groups were astounding considering the size of the local community. There would regularly be well over 150 attendees at these programs on a weekly basis. This led to Rabbi Ross being recognized by National NCSY as “Best of the Best”.

Many of the alumini of these programs today are shomrei shabbos, leaders of Jewish organizations on various community campuses, and B’nei Torah.

This success led to the Rosses being scouted out by the biggest city in Western Canada, Vancouver. Rabbi Ross is the Director of both NCSY and Torah High for Vancouver, and runs programming for all of western Canada. Gila Ross is the Youth Director of the large Modern Orthodox Shul in Vancouver, Schara Tzedeck, where her initiatives like “Families that Give” have reached out to hundreds of people and the fame of the program has spread throughout North America

Rabbi Ross has revolutionized NCSY, as has Gila with programming for Schara Tzedeck, with a real focus being based on Torah programming. The effect is up to 150 kids and teens learning Torah weekly through various means, and tons of kids going to Israel, through NCSY summer programming and gap year programs in Israel.