New York—More than 350 rabbinic, educational and lay leaders from 73 communities across North America and around the globe came together for Yeshiva University’s Eighth Annual Champions Gate National Leadership Conference held in Orlando, Fla., July 25-28.

This year’s theme, “Kehilla: What We Bring to It,” explored the broader narrative of community, inviting participants to journey through four separate realms of communal leadership as they gained practical tools and fostered new collaborative partnerships to address pressing issues facing their communities at home and Orthodox Judaism as a whole.

“The future of our community is dependent on our commitment to Torah values and gifted leadership who support those values throughout our community,” said YU President Richard M. Joel.

Presented by YU’s Center for the Jewish Future (CJF), Champions Gate has grown from a gathering of 40 lay leaders in 2005 into a major event involving dozens or prominent leaders from the Orthodox world. Its creation and growth were made possible by the vision and support of Mindy and Ira Mitzner, vice chair of the University Board of Trustees and chair of the CJF advisory council.

“Bringing together faculty, roshei yeshiva, senior administrators and YU trustees to engage with lay leaders and rabbis from across North America allows us to convene the resources and energies of Yeshiva University to help strengthen communities around the Jewish world,” said Rabbi Kenneth Brander, David Mitzner Dean of the CJF and vice president of university and community life. “The Champions Gate conference is a transformational experience for all involved.”

This year’s conference offered insightful sessions and group discussions about how to incorporate Skills, Knowledge, Inspiration and Networking to become more effective community leaders—how to have “SKIN” in the game.

A conversation on Shabbat, “Kehilla: What We Bring to It,” wove the conference’s diverse strands together into a unified theme.

Other sessions ranged in topic from “Current Trends in Keeping Our Schools and Shuls Safe,” by Leora Joseph, chief deputy district attorney handing the special victims unit in Denver, Colorado, to “60 Ideas in 60 Minutes” from Dr. Jim Cain, a team-building guru and the author of 12 books.

This year, for the first time, conference participants weren’t be the only ones to benefit from the breadth of experience and expertise shared at Champions Gate. Select presentations shared at the conference were filmed and will be made available publicly as the next round of ELI Talks, 12-minute TED-style presentations that seek to share innovative and thought-provoking Jewish content, presented in partnership with the AVI CHAI Foundation.

“I was very intrigued by the notion of ELI Talks coming to Champions Gate,” said Ed Stelzer, an attorney from Teaneck, NJ. “It was exciting to see thoughtful Jewish leaders presenting their ideas and scholarship in this format. I am a big fan of the TED Talks and I appreciate that YU and the Avi Chai Foundation have taken this step of making these important messages available at the conference and later for the world to see online.”