Following their b’nai mitzvahs, many teens still want to continue their Jewish education. They can do so within their Reform congregations through participating in a confirmation program, oftentimes the next step of learning for a Jewish teen. Confirmation classes tend to focus on topics including Jewish identity and culture, interfaith relations and social justice. Many students value what they learn from confirmation, and they celebrate their efforts and accomplishments with a ceremony in the spring. 

However, confirmation is mainly offered at Reform temples rather than Conservative or Orthodox congregations. While they still may have confirmation programs, they may have different agendas, which can explain why United Hebrew Congregation and Shaare Emeth Congregation, both Reform temples, share very similar programs, whereas Congregation B’nai Amoona, which is Conservative, has a seemingly different one. Regardless, all three congregations set out to teach their teens about the importance of Judaism in their lives and society. 

Ben Stettin, a sophomore at John Burroughs School, said that at Shaare Emeth, it  takes a full two years of weekly classes to become confirmed. In ninth grade, his class visited the holy spaces of different faiths to learn about world religions and talked about understanding God and their own Jewish identity. 

“Hearing my classmates’ opinions on the same issues that the Torah and other texts focus on is interesting to me, and I gain a lot of perspective each week at confirmation class just by hearing people share their ideas,” Ben said.

Ben believes that confirmation class is important because “it is preparing [the students] for today’s modern world.” Confirmation class also prepares Ben for his class’ trip to Washington, D.C, where he will be “enforcing the things that we believe in as a Jewish community” by going to over 35 hours of political seminars and drafting bills and lobbying over issues that are important to his Jewish identity. 

“This trip takes into account most of what we have learned already this year. It demonstrates that what we are doing is in confirmation class is also relevant in society,” Ben said. 

United Hebrew’s confirmation class is similar to Shaare Emeth’s. Sophomore Alayna Higdon of Marquette High School recalls how her weekly meetings with her grade talk about similar issues that Shaare Emeth includes in its second year of confirmation. However, unlike Shaare Emeth, UH’s confirmation class is one-year long. Alayna believes that through class discussions of the opinions, morals and values of Judaism, she is becoming a better student, Jew and person each week. 

“It [confirmation] teaches me how to use my Jewish education, even after Sunday school in the real world so I can be a true functioning person in Jewish society,” she said. In addition, like Shaare Emeth, UH’s class also has trip that is the highlight for many students: a weekend-long retreat. “I really liked our confirmation retreat; we talked about different views of God, and it was a good bonding experience,” said Alayna. 

On the other hand, while different than UH and Shaare Emeth, B’nai Amoona’s confirmation class also gets high marks from its participants. 

Junior Bella Nueman of Parkway Central High School was confirmed last year with her grade as well as the grade below her at B’nai Amoona. 

“[Confirmation] was not very popular for people my age, so the temple combined the 9th and 10th graders together to make one confirmation class,” Bella said.  

As a result, B’nai Amoona now has a big confirmation class every other year for a year-long program. Bella talked about how her class’ agenda was different from the other two congregations.

 “We spent the school year learning about prayers…we then had a Friday night service that our class led. We each were responsible for one prayer, and we met with our cantor to work on them.” 

While succeeding at that service was the main goal of confirmation class members, Bella said that her favorite part of the year was the class’ trip to Washington, D.C. Like Shaare Emeth, B’nai Amoona also takes its confirmation calss to D.C. 

“We volunteered and toured the city…I learned a lot and bonded with my friends,” Bella said. “Confirmation was important to me because I got to continue my Jewish education after my bat mitzvah.”