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Jewish Learning Initiative turns 10

By Michael Orbach
Issue of December 4, 2009/ 17 Kislev 5770

To go or not to go is no longer the question.
“75 percent of the graduating population of the Modern Orthodox day-schools are not going to YU or Touro,” asserted Rabbi Ilan Haber, director of the Jewish Learning Initiative on Campus. “The issue is not should or shouldn’t they go to secular university — they are going. The issue for us is how to help them make educated decisions to choose a college environment amenable to their growth and how to best serve their needs once they’re in the college environment.”
The Jewish Learning Initiative on Campus was founded in 2000. Rabbi Menachem Schrader, then a rebbe at Yeshivat Torat Yosef-Hamivtar in Efrat, realized that yeshivas in Israel were helping students in Israel but students in secular universities back in America had only a limited support system.

“It became clear that we were taking students from campuses all over the world, teaching them Torah and then sending them back after a year or two and there was a deep sense I had that we were sending them back to nothing,” said Rabbi Schrader, who is now the director for Nishmat. “Why shouldn’t we try to create a reference of Torah Studies for them to go back to?”

In response, Rabbi Schrader came up an idea that he hoped would allow students to continue their Jewish studies. A partnership between the Orthodox Union and the Hillel campus organization placed Orthodox couples on college campuses to supplement Hillel programming.

“Many Orthodox students were going to campuses and there was no real infrastructure of Orthodox life for them and if there was it wasn’t as strong,” Rabbi Schrader explained. “Torah Judaism was not being represented in the most modern of places by Modern Orthodox.”

The first couples were sent to Yale and Brandeis. There are presently fifteen Jewish Learning Initiative couples on fifteen campuses including New York University, Rutgers, Princeton and Brooklyn College.Husband and wife fill multi-faceted roles on campus, from rabbi to friend to family.

The program stresses five goals, according to Rabbi Haber. In order to be “able to develop relationships where they’re seen as a resource,” the couples need to be a part of the community inside the college. Jewish learning and meeting the educational needs of the students are emphasized. Most couples in the program have earned advanced degrees in both Jewish and secular subjects. The program also focuses on developing community infrastructure inside the university such as building an eruv, offering classes on married life to brides and grooms, as well as empowering students to become leaders in their own right.
Finally, the couple’s are to be role models on campus.

“Students are in a four year window in age and they don’t really interact with families and children,” said Rabbi Haber, “so our educators remind them of the notion of Jewish families. They provide an example in that regard; they model for students how to get along with people who are very different than you, but being confident in who you are and what you believe.”

The program works in tandem with Hillel, which is non-denominational, sharing facilities and office space.
“It’s one of the crown jewels of the Hillel, how well the program works,” explained Wayne Firestone, president of Hillel. “Often in the Jewish world people feel they need to make their own Shabbat if they grew up with a different niggun or tradition. What the JLIC has proven is that there is not only an opportunity to bring Jews of different backgrounds together, there are really some great benefits for that happening.”

“What drew me to this work is the desire to teach students at a time in their lives where they are determining their life’s goals and finding themselves, in a really formative period of their lives,” Yehuda said.

While the couple initially believed they would only be there for two or three years, seven years later they live in Greenwich Village with their four children.
“We intended to be here for 1-2 years, but it’s such an amazing opportunity and such meaningul work — the longer we stay the more passionalte we become about what we do and the harder it is to leave,” said Michelle, who is originally from Woodmere and is currently pursuing her PHD in clinical developmental psychology in Fordham University.They both said that more than the actual teaching, they provide something much more imporant to the students.“They’re looking for something that reminds them of home… People’s experiences of being in a rabbi’s home is something they find very beneficial, when they’re thinking, even subconsciously, about what kind of home they eventually want to establish. “

David Rittberg, acting executive director of the Bronfman Center for Jewish Student Life at NYU, credited the couple with “changing the landscape at NYU”
“In many ways the community exists because of the JLIC couple. We’ve seen an incredible increase in orthodox students at NYU and it can be directly related to the success of Yehuda and Michelle Sarna.”

Questions or comments? Contact Michael Orbach at .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)