For Rosh Hashana, I worked with the Jewish National Fund to create a program where students could send greeting cards to their families for free. Not only were the students sending cards home for the hoildays, they were also learning about the water crisis in Israel (the theme of the cards), but they were also supporting Israel. I worked out a deal with JNF to give us the cards at a significantly reduced price and Hillel picked up the remainder of the cost. The students loved it. One student said that it was the nicest thing that Hillel had ever done. Talk about making an impact. At the Shabbat dinner the week of Rosh Hashana, I had honey sticks donated from Alberston's Grocery as well as apple-flavored Laffy Taffy (from Sam's Club) placed on all of the tables. It defiantely made Shabbat a little more festive.
For Sukkot, we worked with the School of Archetecture (a relationship that has been established for awhile) to help us design sukkot around campus. Basically, Taal and Berl (the Chabad Rabbi) went to the class that we would be working with, and told them the essentially needs of a sukkot (natural roof, three walls, ect) and the significance of the structure. From there, the student's professor chose the three best sukkot from the designs and those students got to work with Hillel and build them. It's an amazing project. We had a thank you to the builders progessive dinner between all of the sukkot, which was really fun. Also, one of my favorite programs all year was called "Pizza in the Hut". It was a FYSH program where we ate Pizza Hut pizza (donated) and had a discussion about the relevance of the sukkah in today's times. It was great and the students really enjoyed it.
Hanukkah is a big one. I planned a program (but I did it many times in different dorms) based upon a program that I loved as a student. Thank you Jodie Gordon (JCSC fellow, Wisconsin Hillel '02-'03 and '03-'04) for a great programming idea! I took Jodie's progam and adapted it to work on this campus. I planned what I called Hanukkah De-Stress Fests which entailed many fun things. There were professional mesuses giving free massages, latkas (made by Ray) with sour cream and lots of applesauce, Krispy Kreme (donated) doughnuts, gelt and dreidel games, Hebrew name finger painting, Israeli Hanukkah music, and tons of students! I held this program three times in different dorms. The first dorm I got 75 students, second time I had 100 students, and in the final hall I got 125 students. Man, what a successful program. I wish that they could have all been that well attended. I also tabled with menorahs and candles, which was helpful to students who didn't have one. As well, the best tabling project all year was making edible deridels. Imagine....one thin stick pretzel, a large (kosher) marshmallow, and a Hershey's kiss. Pretzel on top, suck into the marshmallow, a little lick on the opposite end of the marshmallow, and stick on the kiss, flat side up and you have a dreidel. This is what being a JCSC is all about.
Skipping right along to Passove.r. Be ready to suck it up and be "on" all the time. We have this amazing program called Hillel Passover Seder Grants, which enables students to have a full Seder in their homes with Hillel providing everything they'll need. I coordinated the grants this year with a freshman student. Hillel also had Seders at Hillel both nights and I tabled on Turlington everyday. My tabling included Charoset Tasting, Matzo Ball Eating Contest, How Hot Can You Go-Horseradish Eating Contest, and it all ended with a HUGE Afikomen Adventure, which was a scavenger hunt around campus. The final clue was hidden in The Swamp Stadium. Be sure to do this program again next year. It was so much fun.
We also had a Kumzitz Woodzer Program for Yom Haatzmaut at Camp Shalom in Ocala with UCF and a memorial program for Yom Hazikron.
