It’s a simple problem: Many Cub Scout activities take place on Saturdays. Many Sabbath-observant Jewish kids want to participate in scout activities. But Sabbath-observant Jewish kids can’t swim and hike and build fires on that day.
Michael Kopinsky, a Bala Cynwyd resident, had been hearing about this problem for years from Sabbath-observant friends. So finally, in 2024, the father of three sons set out to solve it.
In November of that year, Kopinsky launched a pack for kids in Bala Cynwyd, for members of his synagogue, Sha’arei Orah, and for anyone else in the area with interest. Thirty-eight kids showed up to the first activity. Throughout the year, 28 participated regularly in hikes, campfires and other adventures.
The pack was popular enough to return for a second year in 2025-26. Kopinsky’s two older sons and 24 other kids are part of the group. A majority of them are Orthodox; most are Sabbath-observant, but some are not.
“It’s great to get that time with them doing specific activities. This past Sunday, we went on a hike. We could have just gone on a hike as a family. But if we had just gone as a family, we wouldn’t have made a fire, roasted marshmallows and drank hot cocoa at the end,” Kopinsky said.
Kopinsky refers to himself as a nerd computer programmer who likes to “sit in a cave” and code all day. But as a kid in Denver, he joined the scouts, and it taught him to tie knots, do first aid and orient a compass, among other skills. More importantly, it pushed him to get in front of the group and lead an activity.
Today, the reclusive coder is comfortable stepping up to lead teams at work. He wants his kids to gain the same confidence.
“It was always sort of a given that, when my kids are old enough, I’ll put them in Scouts,” Kopinsky said.
Yet when his boys grew old enough to join, dad needed a reminder. One day, his wife came home from a thrift store with a Scout handbook.
Kopinsky realized that his oldest son was 8 years old. It was time. There was just nothing like that around, at least not for Sabbath-observant families. The closest such pack was in Blue Bell, about a 40-minute drive from Bala Cynwyd.
“‘OK, I guess someone has to start it,’” Kopinsky recalled thinking at the time.
The Sha’arei Orah member made a spreadsheet of the families who had said they were interested; he sent out messages to local WhatsApp groups; he also started “marketing it heavily” on social media and in shul.
More than 50 families expressed interest, so Kopinsky started filing the paperwork. The group held steady all year. Meetings and activities typically took place on Sundays, though camping trips could actually take place during Shabbat, as long as troop leaders and members arrived before sundown to cook the food.
The group was even able to participate in wider Scout and community events. Kopinsky talked to the organizer of the district Pinewood Derby, an event in which packs build and race wooden toy cars, and convinced him to move the event to a Sunday. During the Cradle of Liberty Council’s Fall Fest, Kopinsky asked if kosher food could be prepared and served as an option; the organizer obliged.
“It was great,” Kopinsky said of the first year.
Breanne Pesis, a Bala Cynwyd resident and Sha’arei Orah member, was part of the group of families who had been discussing a Scout pack. Two of her sons participated during the first year, and while one aged out, the other remains involved.
The mom said her kids enjoy sports, but the timing rarely works. Even if local leagues form a Sabbath-observant team, it often ends up including kids from multiple age groups. There just aren’t enough players to form a fully Sabbath-observant league.
This pack solved that problem.
“Everyone joining this is either going to be Jewish or embracing the way we have things set up,” Pesis said. “There’s never going to be a time where you’re the odd one, or you get put on a team with a different age group.”
Rachel Frankford, a Wynnewood resident, has a son who’s involved in the pack. The family is Jewish but not “Shomer Shabbos,” as Frankford put it, though they try to keep Shabbat as best they can.
The troop was a way to get the benefits of the scouts, but also to connect with other Jews in the area.
“It’s about the traits that the Cub Scouts encourage in the kids: thinking about other people, doing community service, doing things that are part of a group, being outdoors, gaining skills related to different outdoor activities. There’s also a focus on safety, which I really like,” she said. “I like that it’s cooperative but not competitive. My kids also do sports, but this is a part of what we do.”
