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The Jewish Federation of Greater Middlesex County will be presenting the results of a comprehensive demographic survey to the community in a series of events beginning Jan. 8.

Laura Safran, the director of planning and allocations for the Jewish Federation of Greater Middlesex County, said the purpose of the survey was to understand the needs of the local Jewish community.

"The process began because the allocations committee had the foresight to donate money to the Opportunity Fund," Safran said.

In September 2007, the Opportunity Fund was started to bring together people from throughout Middlesex County to talk about the local needs of the Jewish community.

"Everything that we do is for the sake of the community," Safran said.

She said the survey was going to impact the future as well.

"We agreed that it had to have strategic planning," he said. "We had to formulate a plan for the next five years based off what people say in the survey."

The federation hired demographer Dr. Ira Sheskin, from Miami University, to head the project.

Prior to Sheskin beginning the survey, he visited Middlesex County three times, during which he met with the demographic study committees of the federation, representatives from local agencies, and synagogues.

Safran said Sheskin used two methods called the DJN (Distinguished Jewish Names), where he called people based on their last name, and Random Digit Dial where he randomly called area residents.

She said the survey consisted of 27,000 phone calls and 1,076 complete interviews.

Sheskin hired, trained, and paid 34 people from the community to assist with the calls, she said. Additionally, a total of 467 Random Digit Dial surveys were completed, compared to the original goal of 300.

Safran said each interview was 22 minutes, and the questions were based on the age of the person being interviewed, if they had a family, or if they were single, she said. Some of the topics included were: the person or family's income, their feelings about Israel, how they obtain their Jewish news, and how active they are in their Jewish community and temples.

Currently, Sheskin and his team are decoding, analyzing, an editing all of the data, which should be complete by the beginning of January, Safran said.

"The data will serve as a catalyst -- uniting the Jewish community and engaging us all as we build a strong future together," Barry Sherman of Highland Park, the chair of the Greater Middlesex Jewish Community Study said.

The presentations to the community will be held from Jan. 8 to Jan. 12.

On Jan. 8, at the federation offices in South River, there will be a meeting entitled, "People, Participation and Prayer: How Do We Identify, Learn and Grow as Jews," from 6-8 p.m. Attendees will learn about the Jewish community members' religious profile, synagogue affiliation, interest in adult Jewish education, Jewish education for children, membership or involvement in other organizations, obstacles to participation, educational, and geographic and financial profiles of people in relation to all of these issues.

Also on Jan. 8, from 8-10 p.m. there will be a meeting entitled "Care, Community and Connection: Meeting Our Social Service Needs," where people can learn about who has needed help from a social service, did they receive help, and if so, from where; ages and geographic distribution; financial situation; awareness of Jewish social service agencies; perceptions of Jewish social service agencies; membership in Jewish agencies; and gaps in social services.

On Jan. 11, the meetings are: "Jewish Trends that Shape the Future of Northern Middlesex County," from 10 a.m. to 12 p.m. at Old Franklin School, 491 Route 27 in Metuchen; "Jewish Trends that Shape the Future of Central Middlesex County," from 3-5 p.m. at the federation offices; and "Jewish Trends that Shape the Future of Highland Park/South Edison," from 7-9 p.m. at the Senior/Youth Center, 220 6th Avenue, Room 2, Highland Park.

On Jan. 12, a presentation titled, "Jewish Trends that Shape the Future of Monroe Township," will be held from 2-4 p.m. at the Jewish Congregation of Concordia, in Monroe.