The Reform services this past year lacked ruach and a feeling of community. There was no song leader and the service was very dry. I received at template for a Kesher Creative Service that we used occasionally throughout the year. The Kesher Chair, Dan Portilla, and I would choose a theme and include poems, writings, etc. in the service. However, we were never able to find a song leader.
Additionally, I started off the year with a Reform Mitzvah of the Month. In September, I tabled with Reform students and had students in the campus centers make Rosh Hashanah New Year�s Cards for patients in Robert Wood Johnson Hospital. On the Friday before Rosh Hashanah, I went into the student center with all the materials needed to make New Year�s cards. As students walked by they took a few minutes to make a card for the patients of Robert Wood Johnson hospital. (In addition, a small information sheet on Rosh Hashanah and its meaning should be provided for those students who are interested. To make the table a little more appealing, you may want to bring some apples and honey related foods to give away such as sour apple jolly ranchers and honey sticks.) Then, on the Sunday before Rosh Hashanah, a group of students went together to deliver the cards to the Jewish patients at Robert Wood Johnson Hospital for a couple of hours. I organized this event through Rabbi Shira Stern, the Rabbi (who is Reform) of the local hospitals and nursing homes. She has a list of all of the Jewish patients, which made things quite easy for us. On the day of the event, we met her in her office in RWJ Hospital and she took the ten students who attended the program around to all of the patients.
October�s �Mitzvah of the Month� for the Reform students was card making for the rescue workers at Ground Zero in NYC. The JCSC fellow from NYU last year was a Chaplain at the Red Cross this year so he helped me to create this program. When I was talking to him on line he said �there�s no more hope, just very tired and burnt out workers� so I thought students could make letters of hope, appreciation, thanks and encouragement to the rescue workers of 9-11. I met up with two students, Amy and Sarah Weiss, who were enthusiastic about the program and they helped to organize and make a poster for a table to be set up in the student center. I arranged two two hour times for a table on Rutgers College and asked the Reform students to help me table during that time. I bought paper, scissors with funky designs, glue sticks and STICKERS! I had a hard time with reform student involvement to help me table but the passing students in the student center had a lot of fun with the project and were enthusiastic about making the cards. After this event I decided to ditch �Mitzvah of the Month� and try to focus more generally on building a Reform community. I met with Dan Portilla, the Reform chair, about creative services that he was planning and thought it best to establish the reform community that way.
The last month of school I worked very closely with Melissa Rosen, the new Kesher chair, to ensure a good start for the Reform community in the fall. The two of us met once a week to discuss improvements that we could make. She has chosen to only use the Kesher creative service, and she is speaking with many songleaders to guarantee that there will be one every week at services next year. The Reform services attracted about 15 students each Friday night the first few weeks of services last fall, but that gradually diminished so that weekly there was an average of 2-4 students. I believe those original numbers can be maintained and improved through the year if there is a strong start right from the beginning.
There is definitely a need for programming within the Reform community. There are so many unengaged Reform students who are interested in Jewish life, but have not found the right form of entry. It will be your job, along with the Kesher chair, to engage them where they�re at in the Jewish community at Rutgers.