Rabbi Gil Student writes: R. Menachem Schrader, the Founding Director of the OU’s Jewish Learning Initiative on Campus (JLIC) program, said the following at a conference for principals and guidance advisors last week about yeshiva high school graduates who go to secular colleges (link):
The students will be going from the “bubble” of kindergarten through twelfth grade to the different atmosphere of the secular campus. In this environment, “parents have no guarantee their children will remain observant.”
Ira Miller, the Dean of Ramaz said, “We hold our breaths when we let them go” to secular colleges. “They are not finished growing yet, emotionally or spiritually. Where there are programs, we hope they find caring adults, young men and women giving of themselves to inspire confidence.”
I tend to agree, although there are exceptions to every generalization.
See here for the full press release/article: link.
JLAN COMMENTS: 1) Let’s note that JLI is on a number of the "major" campuses for MO Jews.
2) Let’s also note that leaving that "bubble" will happen sooner or later. Now, is it possible for that to happen after college (i.e., send the kids to YU, etc)? Sure. But the students that I’ve seen who leave YU without being married often end up even worse off, because there outside of a very few communities there is very little of a Jewish support network for singles (outside of trying to get them married off). There is very little place for 20-somethings who are umarried in most shuls, and this has a very negative effect.
3) There is no guarantee your kids will remain observant. If you want more of a guarantee, switch to teaching them in Yiddish, don’t teach them English, and teach Hebrew only in the context of limudei kodesh. But enough with the panic.
MEHITZA POSTS: Do you know that Perl and Weinstein’s article has been erased from the internet? It used to be on the RCA’s website — but then it was taken down.
IDFVET POSTS: Perhaps if after 12+(?) years of being enrolled in orthodox schools, and shabbat, and holidays, and "groups" and leading a sheltered life with only being able associate with a certain group and certain friends, and the first time that a child is on their own they find out that there is a bigger world out there, then maybe just maybe everything else that is done early in life is a fake facade. If 12 years of education can be knocked down in 6 weeks then something is very wrong.
We should be calling the "leaders" ‘Jewish Cruise Directors’ not ‘Torah Educators!’ If all someone needs is a shabbat party to retain his/her jewish identity then how strong could it have been to begin with.
RABBI STUDENT POSTS: "The point is that these are unique years of rebellion and identity-formation."
DF POSTS: And that, I think, is what distinguishes the college question from the biblical criticsm question. For concerning both one may ask, if we are to be intelectually honest, and if we are sure of ourselves, what to we have to be afraid of from groups or viewpoints that differ from traditional teachings?
The big difference is, in college, young people are so vulnerable for so many reasons, they can be persauded to accept an alternative "truth" or lifestyle that they would certainly reject upon just a little maturity. The questions posed by biblical criticsim, on the other hand, do not go away ever. This is a key distinction I dont see addressed quite nearly enough.
SIMPLETON POSTS: The legitimization of the secular campus, often under the guise of entering the real world, is a horror for our community. No, not everyone can or should go to YU, but that itself is part of the problem, and should not provide an excuse for the sorry state of affairs we find ourselves in.
Folks, as Perl and Weinstein cogently pointed out, the college campus of this day and age ain’t the "real world." It is a place of rampant promiscuity, alcohol and drug abuse, and a marketplace for decidedly liberal values, not to mention anti-Israel sentiment. These are prevalent in a way that is unmatched in any MO community or workplace. The exposure to these temptations is rarely justified. Have any MO rabbinic leaders ever actively supported these options? Than on what basis do we?
GAVI POSTS: As a MO student who is studying in a secular college:
I think the most important thing to keep people like myself in the fold is for us to live in an established Jewish community (i.e. not just undergraduate students). Barring that, a strong orthodox group on campus (e.g. Hillel, Chabad, JLIC, or anything of the sort) can be helpful.
The worst situation is when students are thrust into a vacuum, Jewishly speaking. Add to that the dangers of secular dorm life (often co-ed, with rampant promiscuity, alcohol abuse, and other unsavoury things), and you have a recipe for religious disaster.
Of course, a large part of the problem is that our community as a whole is woefully unsuccessful at teaching and transmitting our theology correctly. It is no surprise that a confused young person, having no real positive theological or spiritual connection to their faith, begins to question it in college.
[Full disclosure: I went to yeshiva in Israel before college, and took another year off to learn in Israel during my degree. I also got married while I was an undergraduate, and always lived in an established Jewish community off-campus. Perhaps this changes my case a little bit from the norm…
HAGTBG POSTS: You mean Kiruv? Like NCSY? In that case the OU has been "into" this business for over 50 years. And proudly so.
NCSY’s primary purpose is kiruv (i.e. missionizing) of highschool teenagers, despite the function it’s had in NJ.
We are talking here about a college-aimed group aimed at keeping the frum frum. Clearly modeled on the Chabad variant.
(As to your larger point, I freely admit, as I wrote above, that Chabad was not the first in college kiruv; even groups like Hillel play an important role there long preceding Chabad.)
The function being asked of these young couple’s they’ll send out is far more difficult and different then what an NCSY adviser will do.
As to your point about the legitimatization of the secular campus uh … parents are choosing to send the kids there.
They have good reason. In some instances, cost. In others, opportunity. You send a kid to the Ivies and he does well there and doors open for his career that YU could never open. I am not talking about money, though there’s that too. I am talking about options. Being that biochemist, that expert in Near Eastern languages, etc. It may not matter to you. But then, that’s why the parents are ignoring you.
HARVARD STUDENT POSTS: I am a student currently enrolled in Harvard University. I am a product of 12 years of day school education in a Modern Orthodox community, 1 year of yeshiva in Israel, and all I have to say is the following: believe me when I tell you that I have experienced every sensual pleasure you can think of.
NACHUM POSTS: The whole "Yale Five" thing broke when I was in my first year of law school. I remember one Yale grad who was a fellow student writing, on an article in which one of the Orthodox students was moaning about the hedonism of the Yale, "I wish I would have experienced that Yale! Never saw it, though."
