Have you heard the one about the student who asks the librarian for a hot dog? Allow me to refresh your memory: A student approaches a librarian and asks, “Can I have a hot dog?” The librarian responds to the foolish query by snapping, “This is a library!” The student replies, “Sorry,” and whispers, “Can I have a hot dog?”
Pretty much everyone likes Dr. Stephen Pimpare. News that he was denied tenure over the summer sent shockwaves through the Yeshiva community, stunning the undergraduate student body and worrying faculty members currently on tenure track.
Anyone who has spent time in the Nagel Commons or the Heights Lounge is familiar with the distinctive furnishings in both areas. In addition to being quite chic, they are also fairly comfy. Especially given the tight budget for the renovations on these student areas, our new lounges are pleasant and comfortable places to study, meet, or relax.
Quality Assurance for YU , Constructive Criticism for Schools
After almost two years of intense planning, Yeshiva University has completed the first phase of reaccrediting Yeshivot and Seminaries that participate in the S. Daniel Abraham Israel Program (SDAIP). Dr. Hillel Davis, Vice President of University Life, and Dr. Scott Goldberg, Director of the Azrieli Graduate School of Jewish Education and Administration, are spearheading the reaccreditation process.
Have you heard the one about the student who asks the librarian for a hot dog? Allow me to refresh your memory: A student approaches a librarian and asks, “Can I have a hot dog?” The librarian responds to the foolish query by snapping, “This is a library!” The student replies, “Sorry,” and whispers, “Can I have a hot dog?”
In memorable television commercials during the 1980’s, Syms Department Store CEO Sy Syms coined the famous slogan, “An educated consumer is our best customer,” a slogan which has kept the company strong in the face of adversity for over two decades. But now, the business school that bears Sy Syms’ name is doing a disservice to this standard.
This September 11th marked eight years since the catastrophic attacks on the World Trade Center. In light of the significance of the day I decided to visit Ground Zero.
For those who know enough YU trivia to surmise that the title of this column is a throwback to the infamous 2006 Commie editorial “Shut Down Stern,” I'll state at the outset that my words here will not be another doomed-to-failure cry to combine our undergraduate campuses; neither will this column constitute a critique of our sister-publication to the south, the official undergraduate newspaper of Stern College for Women and the women's division of the Sy Syms School of Business. Though in the past I've graced The Commentator's pages with my appraisal of Stern and its shortcomings (“YC, SCW, and the Scandal of Academic Difference” October 13, 2008), I really do have great respect for the Beren campus and its occasional publication.
Changes all around at Wilf Campus Dining Hall
Students walked into YU cafeterias across all campuses this semester to find Coca Cola brand beverages offered nearly exclusively over other brand drinks. Under a five-year contract with Coca Cola, YU will no longer be selling Pepsi or Snapple products on its campuses. “We receive royalties which will be used toward scholarship funds including our ability to apply for additional funds through the Coke Scholarship Program,” wrote Jack Zencheck, Director of Procurement Services, in an email outlining the contractual benefits YU will receive from Coke. To the relief of many students, drinks such as Starbucks Coffee and PepsiCo’s Tropicana will remain on cafeteria shelves, as Coke does not produce kosher alternatives to these beverages.
This summer, an unusual fear swept the nation: people were worried about catching the flu. This was no ordinary flu, but a new strain of flu, one that was very infectious, one against which no one seemed to have any immunity. The results are common knowledge – school closings, people wearing surgical masks, and to some extent, general hysteria.
On Sunday September 13th, Yeshiva welcomed a crowd of over 700 people to the celebration and dedication of the state-of-the-art 60,000 square foot Glueck Center for Jewish studies.
Why It’s Never Too Early to Start
Unless you spent your summer backpacking in Siberia, you probably heard at least someof the news about the state of the economy and the job market. Although forecasters are expecting the job loss declines to slow, that doesn’t mean it’ll be easy to find opportunities. So what can you do to give yourself an edge? START EARLY! No matter what year you are in at YU, it’s never too early to start planning your career. Here are steps each of you can take to get started. This is simply a guideline, so make sure to discuss your plans with a Career Development Center (CDC) counselor to strategize specifically for your situation:
I have always been a crazy Yankee fan.
When I heard about the Yankees Fantasy Camp and the opportunity to be a New York Yankee for a week, play in the Yankees spring training facility in Tampa, Florida, be coached by Yankee Legends, and play against them in a Dream Game, I was excited about the prospects of doing so.
A Student’s Lament
“Prometheus, Pallas from on high, / Down to earth a vessel brought, / With nectar of the heavens fraught…” When the poet Johann Wolfgang Van Goethe wrote these eighteenth-century lines, he almost certainly spoke of TWIZZLERS Twerpz tangy filled chews. Familiar to Wilf Campus students of the past several years as one of the caf store’s hottest items, Twerpz has consistently flown off the shelves wherever it appears, fueling dozens (and possibly hundreds) of late-night cramming sessions, essays, and conversations in dorm rooms. While Nagel Bagel and the Campus Shoppe may still carry the delicious “nectar of the heavens,” they will not continue to do so, as the candy has (sadly) been discontinued by The Hershey Company.
With the 2009-2010 school year well under way, many students have already begun to habituate themselves to a particular eating schedule based on when and where their classes are held. It is no secret that the demands of a dual-curriculum schedule do not leave much time for rest and relaxation, so knowing the ins and outs of Yeshiva’s dining options uptown is crucial for all students.
New Literary Magazine Channels Student Creativity, Excitement
YU has long had a history of the spreading of ideas among students and the subsequent discussion, challenges, and arguments that follow them. This process is, in essence, dialogue. The Commentator serves this function in some ways, as does Kol Hamevaser, but a hole still exists for the more creative-minded. And last week (in typical ystud fashion) several students proudly proclaimed to jump into that breach with a new Literary Magazine.
Sirena Rubinoff was born in the island of Guam while her father was stationed on the naval base there, in 1985. Her family later moved to San Diego, California and became Baalei Teshuva in the late 1990’s.
An In-Depth Look at the YU Presidential Fellowship
As graduation nears for many Yeshiva students, the search for an occupation post-college begins to take center stage. Although many opt to enroll in graduate school immediately upon their departure from YU, some take jobs or travel, while others take time off for learning and other activities.
The doors of John F. Kennedy International Airport automatically spread apart before me, tempting me onto the next stage of my journey. Free from finals and summer courses, and several months after my first email to the contact us link on Nefesh B’Nefesh’s website, I was finally ready to experience an Aliyah. I walked past Marc Rosenberg (Project Manager of Overseas Programming) as he helped Sirena Rubinoff pull her luggage inside the airport and into the sprawling terminal buzzing with human migration.
Student Pulse Food Services How many meals a week do you eat in one of the Wilf Campus cafeterias? 0 30.3% 1-3 9.2% 4-7 8.3% 8-11 31.2% 12+ 21.1% What is your favorite Wilf Food Services Station? Furman Dining Hall Inside Line 35.
Spoiler alert: Not everyone goes to Israel for yeshiva or seminary. I know, what a shocker. However, that does not mean that they do not learn anything either. In fact, as Lili, Chaya, and Or travel around Israel in Sex and the Holy Land, formerly featured in the New York Fringe International Festival, they learn more about themselves and their Jewish identity than they did during years at yeshiva.
Special Exhibition at the Neue Galerie: Oskar Kokoschka
Oskar Kokoschka (1886–1980) is regarded as one of the key figures of the Expressionist movement – a movement founded in early 20th century that did not simply depict the outside world, but rather, through exaggeration and distortion, imposes its own responses to the objects of sense perception. In many senses, this movement was a response to its predecessor, Impressionism, which is a subjective endeavor that seeks to distort reality and create intensely emotional artwork, as opposed to depicting reality objectively.
On Thursday, September 17th, the Wilf Campus community marked the 222nd anniversary of the ratification of the U.S. Constitution with a lecture given by Dr. Murray Dry. Professor Dry is the Charles A. Dana Professor of Political Science at Middlebury College in Vermont and is this year’s distinguished visiting scholar of the Jay and Jeanie Schottenstein Honors Program, the first visiting scholar hosted by the program since its inception ten years ago.
During the week following Succot vacation, representatives from Yavneh Olami will come to Yeshiva to deliver an information session about their Summer Internship Program (SIP). The program affords college students the rare, valuable opportunity to spend a summer interning in Israel. Yavneh Olami listens to each student’s preferences about what kind of work they are interested in, and works with them to find an internship best suited for their career aspirations. Internships this past summer included work with law, architecture and accounting firms, medical research, social justice organizations, The Jerusalem Post, The Israel Museum, graphic design companies, and many more attractive professional pursuits. Such internships grant students not only valuable professional experience, but also the precious chance to get a feel for working in Israel. Any students even slightly considering Aliyah are especially encouraged to attend. At the session, Yavneh Olami will also introduce their brand new, long-term (semester) internship program, starting this February. Yavneh Olami representative Shana Krakowski will be available to answer all questions about this popular program shortly after Succot.
At the dedication of the Jacob and Dreizel Glueck Center for Jewish Study on September 13th, President Richard Joel announced Dr. Henry Kressel’s appointment as Chairman of the Board of Trustees. Dr. Kressel works as a partner and senior managing director of Warburg Pincus, a prestigious venture capital firm. His work with the Sarnoff Corporation yielded the first practical semiconductor lasers and the first epitaxial silicon solar cell. In July of 2004, Dr. Kressel was elected to the Sy Syms School of Business Board of Directors. He holds 31 U.S. patents and has published over 120 papers and three books. He graduated Yeshiva College in 1955. In addition to other involvements as a donor, he founded the annual Henry Kressel Research Scholarship last year to perpetuate the student research community.
The Jim Joseph Foundation of San Francisco, California recently awarded YU a $4,000,000 grant to support the university’s training of future Jewish educators. With the grant, YU will create the Jim Joseph Foundation Jewish Educator Continuum, an initiative to identify and capitalize on its opportunities to bolster its education of aspiring Jewish teachers. Through the Continuum, YU hopes to both improve its current educational program and to train more students. Jim Joseph was a passionate Jewish philanthropist. He believed that the creation and maintenance of effective educational programs for young Jewish people carried the key to Judaism’s success in the United States.
“Happy happy oh my friends...” It is with these gleefully triumphant lyrics that Phish commence their first album released in five years – and they could not be more apropos. In 2004, following the release of their mediocre Undermind, Phish announced their breakup, claiming that the entire operation had become just too big and stressful to carry on. Now, five years later, the quartet has reunited, looks healthy and, having just completed a successful summer-tour, they and their fans could not be “happier.”
Undergraduate Enrollment Down More Than 100, Admissions Implements New Strategies
This academic year saw a decrease in student enrollment at YU, which Administrators generally believe is due to the trying economic times In order to help families through the difficulty of the recession and ensure that Yeshiva’s enrollment doesn’t suffer continued or more serious decline, the departments of Admissions and Enrollment are implementing creative and aggressive new strategies to yield more vigorous numbers.
Isaacs Brings Child Psychology (and Wellness and Friendliness) to Yeshiva College
Among Yeshiva College’s psychology students, Dr. Jenny Isaacs’s smiling face and warm demeanor is no secret – but students who have not chanced upon her classes might not know about this exceptionally friendly professor. On campus since Fall 2005, Isaacs has taught a number of courses in her department, including Introduction to Psychology, the Psychology of Death and Dying, Clinical Psychology, Abnormal Psychology, and an Advanced Research Seminar. She also teaches Introduction to Statistics, a course with applications beyond Psychology.
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