Charlotte Barrios started at the Jewish Community Relations Council of Greater Washington as an intern in January 2023 and is now a program associate for their Dr. Stuart Lessans Israel Action Center.
Barrios studied government and international politics at George Mason University and was involved with the Hillel there before graduating in December 2023. She was a lifeguard for two and a half years at GMU. She moved to Silver Spring at the beginning of the summer.
Tell me about your Jewish upbringing and background.
I’m originally from Atlanta, Georgia, and I grew up going to a Reconstruction synagogue called Bet Haverim, which is founded by LGBTQ Jews, so it’s a really cool, funky place to be. Growing up, a big part of what we did was social justice, which I found to be really cool and interesting. I also went to Young Judaea camp, Camp Judaea in North Carolina and Camp Tel Yehuda in New York. That was really fun because I had a chance to learn about Israel and I even went to Israel for four weeks.
I fell in love with being Jewish and loved being around all my Jewish friends getting to do things that are unique to being Jewish. It’s just a different community when you grow up around a bunch of Jews; I was one of the only Jews in my class at home. I like being around the Jewish community because you don’t have to explain everything all the time — people get it, which is great.
You started at JCRC as an intern. What made you decide to stay on with them?
JCRC is such a unique organization. The reason I wanted to stay on is because it’s a local organization; it’s small and tight-knit so you feel like you’re really making an impact and a difference in the community because you’re engaging on a level with the community that I don’t know I would have gotten at the national level. They give me so many opportunities, especially when you get to see all these different aspects of the work, which I really love.
I get to focus on doing Israel work, which I really love. When I went to school, that’s what I wanted to do; I wanted to work in Israel in the foreign area. When I started as an intern, I was doing a lot of local education and advocacy work, which ended up being really interesting to me. It was great that I got to pursue this other angle to Israel that I didn’t really think about when I was in school. So now I get to do more local [work], bringing education about Israel to the people here, and I used to do Israel advocacy, because not everybody on the local level understands.
Why is this work important to you?
I think especially right now in the media, it’s such a volatile conversation and topic for a lot of people, and I think a lot of people don’t necessarily understand everything, or certain aspects about what Israel is. They just read Al-Jazeera. I’ve had conversations with people where they’re like, ‘Oh, you should read Al-Jazeera; it’s a really great source.’ And I’m like, ‘Okay, have you read anything from the other side of things?’ or ‘Have you read anything that is not sponsored by a government run by a terrorist organization?’ They don’t necessarily have that understanding and I think it’s just important to be able to have those conversations and to help people.
We do a lot of work with high schoolers, and we’re doing a program for them this Sunday to learn about how they can talk to people on college campuses. A lot of them don’t have the opportunities to have these conversations on a daily basis, [so we] give them the information that they need or that they’re looking for to have these conversations and ease some of their anxieties. It’s just great to be able to do that kind of stuff.
What does a typical work day look like for you?
It’s a lot of phone calls and talking with my colleagues. It’s planning events, that’s a lot of what I do. I said we’re a tight-knit organization, so sometimes people will come and ask me for my opinion on something they’re putting together.
How does your college education relate to what you’re doing today?
I’m an international relations major; I wanted to study Israel and the Middle East. A lot of my classes related around that, and also Judaism. So [I] bring the knowledge I learned in college to all [my] Israel education work. We also talk to legislators and do advocacy days.
What’s one challenge in your role?
Probably doing work about Israel, which is really hard right now. I love doing it. I love being an advocate for a country I really care about. It can be challenging when I meet new people and have to talk about the work that I’m doing, but it’s all about being proud and confident. I love what I’m doing. When I meet new people, I don’t want to hide who I am, so that’s probably the biggest challenge.
