Jacob Mehari is not the typical California-born American teen. This month’s Salute to Youth honoree may have been born in Sacramento, Calif., but his roots go all the way to Ethiopia. Although he spent his early years in the USA, he lived in Israel from the ages of 6 to 10.
The time he spent as a child in Isarel, he said, was a “life-changing experience” for him.
“I was surrounded by a lot of relatives and I became familiar with my Ethiopian-Israeli identity. I learned about my heritage and the culture that accompanies it. I am grateful that I was able to be surrounded by an Israeli community, as well as to learn about the Ethiopian culture I knew little about. It was an eye-opening experience,” Jacob said.
The son of Girmay Mehari and Tseganesh Hailu, Jacob has been attending the Hyman Brand Hebrew Academy for the past seven years. Currently a senior, he has maintained a 3.8 GPA while playing soccer and being involved in other activities.
Laura Hewitt, HBHA’s director of testing and teaching development, nominated Jacob as a Salute to Youth honoree for his “leadership role for our JETS TEAMS competition and volunteering to work with younger students after school.” He is also a member of the school’s National Honor Society.
Jacob is the team captain of the school’s Junior Engineering Technical Society (JETS). “This is an engineering competition that requires participants to answer real-life engineering scenarios using math and science,” he said.
He enjoys the competitions for several reasons. He truly finds it interesting to work on math and science for a project he finds meaningful. One such meaningful experience for him was working on a project that developed and implemented cleaner and reusable forms of energy. Along those lines he would like to become a mechanical engineer. His goal is to attend college in California because he believes there are many engineering opportunities in that state.
But his involvement at the HBHA does not stop with JETS. He is an active member of the school’s Holkim Yarok, Going Green Club. The group has placed recycle bins for plastic, aluminum and paper around the Jewish Community Campus. He and other group members empty the bins every week and make sure the contents are properly recycled.
Jacob also tutors younger students.
“The best part of tutoring children is the sense of accomplishment achieved when you know your work paid off,” he said. “I say this because after tutoring a child, he earned an A on his test. I felt proud of the work I put in, and the student’s mom praised me for it.”
Then there is his role as forward/midfielder on the HBHA soccer team. He had played soccer as a child in Israel and enjoyed it, so he continues to play while in high school.
A member of Congregation Ohev Sholom, where Jacob became a Bar Mitzvah, he recites the Haftarah every year on the anniversary of his Bar Mitzvah. He occasionally leads prayers and reads Torah at the congregation as well.
“Jacob is an exception to the post-Bar Mitzvah drop-out syndrome,” Ohev Rabbi Scott White said.
“It’s almost four years later and most Shabbat mornings you can still find him among the congregants in our pews. In fact, you could say he’s doing a double-mitzvah, in the sense that (at least in my experience) many Jewish day school students probably feel they don’t need to come to shul on Shabbat because they’ve ‘done their job’ by davening in the school minyan all week. Add to all that the fact that Jacob is part of our regular rotation for leading Musaf, and you’ve got a young man who evinces quite a deep devotion to Judaism. I will deeply miss him when he goes off to college next year,” the Conservative rabbi continued.
As if his activities at HBHA and his devotion to shul didn’t occupy enough of his time, Jacob also volunteers at Village Shalom on Sundays to play bingo with the residents and assist them.
“Spending time at Village Shalom might not seem like a lot,” he said, “but it feels good to know you made a difference in an elderly person’s day by helping them play a game and making time to get acquainted.”
Jacob’s role model in the Jewish community is Rabbi Jonathan Rudnick, the Jewish Community Chaplain. Rabbi Rudnick is also a member of Ohev and Jacob sees him a lot around HBHA.
“Whenever I see him there is a smile on his face, and when I speak to him a smile falls onto mine as well. He is very knowledgeable and chants Torah extraordinarily. His dedication to his congregation and the volunteering he does to lead sixth-grade prayers on top of his other obligations inspire me to become a better person,” Jacob said.
Rabbi Rudnick thinks highly of Jacob as well.
“Yaacov, as I call him, is a very special young man who carries himself softly yet surely and with lots of neshama (soul),” said Rabbi Rudnick. “He is a regular at shul, and he seems deeply connected Jewishly in a way that I experience as natural for him. I see Yaakov as a blessing in and to our K.C. Jewish community and knowing him gives me hope in the future of Am Yisrael.”