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a comment about this article Ohio Hillel leaders scratch heads over ‘closed
doors’ implication
BY: CATHRYN HORWITZ Editorial
Intern
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| Students in Hillel and interfaith
group Case Cooperation Circle react to anti-Semitism by
making Prints for Peace. |
“Hillel opens up to non-Jews,
focuses on wider campus,” noted the headline in a JTA article
published last March.
In response, some Ohio Hillel
directors are asking, “When were we ever closed off?”
“(I)n a move that Hillel
leaders say has been forced upon them by this generation’s
altered social landscape, the organization is throwing open
its doors to everyone, designing programs that appeal to Jews
and non-Jews, and hyping its contribution to university n not
only Jewish n life,” writes JTA reporter Ben Harris at the
global news agency that serves Jewish media.
Gary
Coleman, executive director of the Cleveland Hillel
Foundation, says the article n particularly the headline n is
a little misleading.
“Hillel is here to expand Jewish
life on campus for Jewish students,” says Coleman. “Our
programs are open to anybody on campus.”
“We try to be all things for
all people,” says Susannah Sagan, associate director of The
Ohio State University’s Hillel. “We feel that we have to meet
the students where they are, not where we think they should
be.”
Jennifer Chestnut, executive director of Hillel at
Kent State University, takes issue with how the JTA reporter
paraphrased Hillel’s new mission statement. “Prior to 2006,”
Harris wrote, “the organization sought to increase the number
of Jews doing Jewish with other Jews. Now it seeks to enrich
Jewish student life, the Jewish people and the
world.”
Chestnut, who helped craft the new mission
statement, says a vital phrase is missing, giving the wrong
impression. It reads, “Hillel’s mission is to enrich the lives
of Jewish undergraduate and graduate students so that they may
enrich the Jewish people and the world” (emphasis
mine).
The wording in the JTA article seems to indicate
Hillel has shifted its focus to improving the overall world,
rather than nurturing Jewish students to do just that,
Chestnut explains. “We’re simply empowering Jewish students to
do good.”
While Hillel programs are constantly adapting
and changing to appeal to each generation of students, their
directors maintain that the goals have not fundamentally
changed.
“We provide a good variety
of social, cultural and religious events so there is something
for everyone,” Cleveland Hillel Jewish student life
coordinator Ricky Marcus says. “Even the Jewish students don’t
always want to do something Jewish.”
Coleman of the
Cleveland Hillel Foundation says students tell Hillel
directors they want to socialize with a wider range of
students. Hillel does what it can to make that possible, such
as integrating kosher dining into regular dining halls, so
students who keep kosher can eat and socialize with those who
do not.
Programs at the OSU Hillel are fairly
all-encompassing, notes Sagan. Non-Jewish students attend
events for a variety of reasons, whether for a diversity
requirement, curiosity, community service, or because their
friends are going.
“There’s a difference between
‘intention’ and ‘byproduct,’” Chestnut says. “A byproduct of a
fantastic Israeli hip-hop group coming to campus is that you
may see non-Jewish students” attending the event. The
intention of such an event would be to bring Jewish students
together to celebrate Israeli music, she explains.
In February, the Cleveland
Hillel sponsored a discussion series at John Carroll
University called “A Taste of Judaism,” hosted by Rabbi
Matthew J. Eisenberg of Temple Israel Ner Tamid. The program
was a crash course on the history of Judaism, Torah, and
explanations of Jewish traditions and practices. Those present
were, for the most part, not Jewish, Hillel’s Marcus says, but
they were interested in learning about Judaism as part of
their own spiritual journeys.
Coleman and Hillel’s
Cleveland metro director Jill Ross are proud of other
interfaith programs at Case Western Reserve University. For
example, the InterReligious Council (IRC), a forum to discuss
the Middle East peace effort, interacts with the Muslim
Students Association.
For the last 10 years, Kent
State’s Hillel has made interfaith trips to the United States
Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C., which Chestnut
says attracts a great number of students who are not Jewish.
The trip is part of an effort to “deepen awareness about
prejudice, genocide, and what intolerance and hatred
bring.”
Along similar lines, Hillel organized Kent
State’s Save Darfur Coalition. Hillel spearheads the project,
but 12 different departments and student organizations at Kent
are involved and work together on various initiatives.
While Ohio Hillel directors
maintain their goal is to serve Jewish students, Jewish people
do not live in a bubble, Coleman says. “As Jews, we have a
commandment to make the world a better place, not just for the
Jews.”
with reports from Jennifer
Daddario
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