Founded in 2016, teen mental health nonprofit BaMidbar launched as a wilderness retreat in the Colorado Rockies and expanded in the last decade, adding professional development programs, mental health and addiction awareness workshops, a fellowship and a Boston office for in-person and online therapy. The goal was to go national, and it seemed its expansion was cruising forward as it added a teen and young adult advisory committee in March, but in September the organization abruptly announced that it was shuttering.

 

On Tuesday, weeks after letting the organization’s final employee go, BaMidbar fulfilled its goal, ensuring a continued national presence as the Jewish Federations of North America announced the acquisition of both BaMidbar and The Blue Dove Foundation, which was founded in 2018 as a tiny volunteer-run mental health nonprofit in Atlanta. Both organizations will be integrated into the federation’s BeWell initiative, which helps communities support the mental health of teens and young adults ages 12-26...

 

...“We were calling it a [mental health] crisis in ‘22,” Shira Hutt, executive vice president of the Jewish Federations of North America, told eJewishPhilanthropy. “I don’t know what the next level up is from crisis, but the needs are great.”

 

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