Photo courtesy of the OU

OU Starts Own Chabad-on-Campus Style Program

The Orthodox Union has teamed up with Jewish campus group Hillel to begin an outreach program for Jewish college students in the mold of Chabad-on-Campus. The OU will dispatch married couples who will serve as rabbis and rebbetzins, co-directing the organization’s branches on campuses across the U.S.

from Arutz Sheva:

Every Friday morning for a month, rebbetzin Ariel Pardo has been meeting with three female Jewish students at Brandeis University for deep conversations that wind their way from Jewish ritual to intimacy.

“Ari is always so open and she makes us feel so comfortable,” said Mollie Goldfarb, 19, a first-year student. “She gives off that warm, inviting presence everyone can be around. It’s never just her teaching us, but us learning and discussing together.”

Pardo and her husband, Rabbi David Pardo, are the Brandeis campus representatives of the Heshe and Harriet Seif Jewish Learning Initiative on Campus (JLIC), a program that places young, married Orthodox male and female educator couples on college campuses to foster and cultivate Orthodox Jewish life. The couples host everything from one-on-one learning and group classes to Shabbat and holiday meals.

A unique partnership between the Orthodox Union and the Jewish campus group Hillel, OU-JLIC currently has 60 educators on 22 campuses across North America. These modern Orthodox educators serve primarily Orthodox students, and the average educator couple serves for about four to five years.

“We’re working with a population that is very intelligent,” said Sharona Kaplan, the OU-JLIC educator at UCLA along with her husband, Rabbi Aryeh Kaplan. “Our job is to help their relationship with Judaism mature, to help them find value and relevance – and ultimately own their Judaism.”

Click here to continue reading at Arutz Sheva.

11 Comments

  • alum

    Since when is Hillel Reform? When I was a college student it was “Jewish” as we all are! It was certainly a better choice than the Jewish fraternities and sororities.

  • lubavitch

    the ikar is to connect people to the rebbe and chassidus this is another helem no diffrent than aish

    • Citizen Berel

      No connecting yidden with torah and mitvos is not a helem.

      If there is a source in the Rebbe’s Torah to the effect that yidden doing outreach to brings other yidden closer to Torah and Mitzvos should only be done by chassidim then please share.

      Seriously, find a source that says if a yid isn’t a Lubavitcher he should refrain from influencing his fellow yidden from doing Torah an mitzvos, then please enlighten us all. Because that is exactly what you are advocating.

      There are way too few yidden doing this type of work, mostly for lack of funding.

  • The kangeroo

    Maybe Lubavitch should take a break and concentrate on paying rhe Beis Rivka teachers.

  • to number 5

    the rebbe wanted that lubavitch be the source of yiddshkiet in the world from the hechsher to kehot being the biggest book store (unfortantly isnt) we dont put down other peoples work however the fact that others are working on campuses were we have bati chabad is not good we should be the olny provider

    • Milhouse

      Garbage. Honestly, where do you come up with such ideas? The Rebbe explicitly encouraged non-Lubavitch Orthodox rabbis and organisations to spread their versions of yiddishkeit, and on one occasion even rescued a major “competitor” from bankruptcy.

      The Rebbe did not want Kehos to be the biggest book store. On the contrary, Kehos only publishes our own material. In the early years when there was a shortage of basic seforim Kehos published chumoshim, mishnayos, gemoros, and other necessary things, but as soon as other publishers entered the market Kehos pulled out, because that is not its mission. (Just as, when there was a shortage of siddurim in Russia, the Rebbe Nishmoso Eden published a Nusach Ashkenaz version of Tehillas Hashem.) When Artscroll wanted Kehos to publish his Megillas Esther, Kehos said that was not its mission, so they went and founded their own publishing house and were BH very successful, and may they continue to be successful, because Kehos is not a competitor in their field.

    • Citizen Berel

      You just made all that up right now.

      Site anything implicating that the there is anything good that chassidim should do that other yidden should not do!

      The only provider? Completely unhinged.