Hebrew University's Historic Role

Editor's Note: Samuel
Rothberg,
president of American Friends of the
Ilvbrew University and chairman of the
narerssig's board of governors. is a
!under biochemist and businessman ,oho
since 1965 has devoted all his energies
toward Israeli and Jewish community
problems. Mr. Rothberg, who is credited
it ith having channeled $30.000.000 to Is-
aeli industry, is also. among
other
things, chairman of the American Jew-
ish League for Israel. president of Capi.
tot for Israel and of Israel Investors
Corporation, vire president
of the
Anierscan Committee for the %Selz-
mann Institute, and national cam-
paign chairman for the State of Israel
Bond Oryanization. Mr. Rothberg. 55.
is a native Philadelphian who lives
en Peoria,

•

By SAMUEL ROTHBERG

(Copyright 1910. ETA, Inc.)

.

5'

The Hebrew University—the uni-
versity of the Jewish people and a
great contemporary institution of
higher learning—is Israel's train-
ing ground in social sciences, law,
scienc e, agriculture, medicine,
dental medicine and humanities,
in which areas it maintains facul-
ties. In addition, it operates schools
of pharmacy, education, social,
librarian training and home eco-
nomics. Research is also conducted
in such areas as education for the
disadvantaged, Jewish education
in the Diaspora, biology, Jewish
music, Asian and African studies.
and Hebrew bibliography, manu-
scripts and publishing.
The Hebrew University was
opened in 1925 on Mount Scopus
and remained there until 1948,
when the hill became inaccessible.
During the Six-Day War of 1967,
the campus was liberated by the
Israeli Defense Forces and re-
stored to the university, which
thereupon embarked on planning
for its future use as a University
City with teaching and residential
accommodations for 8,000 students
and faculty members. In 1954,
during the exile from Mount Scopus
campus, a new campus was built
at Givat Ram, west of Jerusalem.
It currently houses the bulk of the
University's teaching and research
facilities and the Jewish National
and University Library.
In 1969-70 the students numbered
15,316. Of the graduates and under-
graduates, 4,500 were in the Fac-
ulty of Humanities, 3,200 in Social
Sciences. 850 in Law, 1,970 in
Mathematics and Science, 430 in
Agriculture, 536 in Medicine, 182
in Dental Medicine, 158 in Phar-
macy. 260 in the Paul Baerwald
School for Social Work, 75 in the
Graduate Library School and 25 in
Home Economics. (Students in the
School of Education are included
in the Faculty of Humanities). In
addition, there were 480 students
included in the pre-academic pro-
gram, and 1,100 new overseas stu-
dents. There were 950 students
working towards doctoral degrees.
The major proportion of the stu-
dents had received their secondary
education in Israel.

The number of students from
other countries has steadily in-
creased • In 1969-70 they num-
bered some 3,200, of whom about
half were from the United States
and the other half from some 50
other countries, including devel-
oping nations in Asia and Africa.
The number of Israeli Arab and
Druze students is 250 in the aca-
demic year of 1970-71. The aca-
demic staff numbers 1,800, a
large proportion of them grad-
uates of the university.

In the academic year just ended,
the Hebrew University awarded
1,840 bachelor's degrees, 325 mas-
ter's degrees, 86 MDs and DMDs
(dentistry), 135 PhDs and 321 di-
ploma degrees. By the summer of
1969 it had awarded 19,416 degrees
as follows: 1,220 PhDs, 1,153 MDs,
150 DMDs, 18 JDs (juris doctor)
5,691 master's and 9,010 bachelor's.
In the new academic year, which
commences Sunday, the university
will have the largest enrollment of
students in its history — almost
16,000. Those studying for higher
degrees will represent approxi-
mately 30 per cent of the total.

The origins of the Hebrew Uni-
versity go back to the 1880s when ,
with the rise of the Jewish national
movement, the need was felt for a
Jewish university which would
serve as a focus for the scientific
and cultural aspirations of the Jews

of Palestine and at the same time

provide a center from which the
Jewish people could make its own
spec if i c contribution to world
knowledge. It was also considered
necessary in view of the fact tha t
many young Jews were excluded
from the universities of Eastern
and Central Europe.
On April 1, 1925, the university
was formally opened at a cere
mony attended by a galaxy of
distinguished visitors from all over
the world. Dr. Chaim Weizmann,
president of the World Zionist Or-
ganization, presided, and the chiof
inaugural address was delivered by
the Earl of Balfour, author of the
Balfour Declaration.
As the university expanded its
curriculum, enrollment increased.
Under the leadership of Dr. Judah
L. Magnes new departments were
set up, and with the financial as-
sistance of Jews throughout the
world the once-barren ridge of
Mount Scopus was in due course
covered with an array of imposing
buildings. After the establishment
of the state of Israel, the faculty
was enlarged by the addition of
personnel from the United States,
Canada, England and South Africa,
but it was largely the graduates of
the university itself who began to
fill the academic posts.

versity and an English-language
summer session, as well as pro-
grams involving scholarships, fel-
lowships, faculty exchanges, and
other activities designed to create
a cross-cultural program between
the university and the academi?
community of the United States.
During the period of the emer-
gency moratorium on fund-raising
drives of Israeli institutions of
higher learning in the United
States, which recently has been
proclaimed, all fund-raising activi-
ties of the American Friends on
behalf of the Hebrew University
have been converted and directed
to aid the United Jewish Appeal
and Bonds campaigns. The leader-
ship of American Friends believes
that the regard of those organiza-
tions for the very existence of the
state of Israel is indisputably para-
mount.

'The truly wise man must be as
intelligent and expert in the use
of natural pleasures as in all the
other functions of life. So the

sages lived, gently yielding to

the laws of our human lot, to

Venus and to Bacchus.
—Montaigne.

Own l uxurious
condominium
apartment in
SOUTHFIELD.

• •

Hebrew University
Dormitory Dedicated

•111111),N

JERUSALEM — A dormitory
housing 32 students of the Hebrew
University was dedicated on the
Givat Ram campus Oct. 30, in
the presence of the donors. Mr.
and Mrs. Larry Frank of Atlanta,
Ga.
The dormitory is one of the com-
plex known as "shikunei eleph,"
erected recently by the university
to solve acute housing problems
among its 16,000 strong student
body. The complex has made avail-
able to the university a further
1,100 dormitory places. Each build-
ing is equipped with a central
kitchen, including lock-up refri-
gerators and gas cookers, as well

From the beginning the uni-
versity's influence was felt
throughout the country. Its medi-
cal research contributed appre-
ciably to the raising of health
standards. Research conducted in
its laboratories benefited agri-
culture and industry. The univer-
sity provided teachers for a
rapidly growing school popula-
tion, and its scholars played a
major role in adapting the an-
cient Hebrew language to mod- as all usual facilities.
ern requirements. By the end of
The Frank dormitory was given
1947 the university was firmly by Mr. and Mrs. Frank and Mr.
established as the major institu- and Mrs. Sidney Lerman, in honor
tion of higher learning in the of their mother. Mrs. Rae Rosen
country and was receiving in- berg Frank, and in memory of
creasing recognition in academic their father, Morris Frank.
circles abroad. The number of
University President Avraham
students had risen to 1,000, and Harman paid tribute to the gen-
that of faculty to 190. Large-scale erosity of the Frank family.
plans for expansion were under
way, but before they could be
SAVE 20%
carried out, the War of Indepen-
dence intervened and Mount
IBM Selectries
Scopus was cut off from the rest
SCM & Victor
of the country.

Overnight, the university's build-
ings and facilities, the library and
the major part of the scientific
equipment, were no longer accessi
ble to students and faculty. Never-
theless, in the shortest possible
time the university was function-
ing again, in makeshift provisional
premises in the city, gradually ac-
quiring new books and scientific
apparatus to replace what it had
lost.
Despite the difficulties under
which it labored, the university's
progress during the next few years
was more rapid than ever before,
for it now had to serve the needs
of the newly created state of
Israel; to train personnel, of which
there was a serious dearth in every
sphere, and to help accelerate the
scientific development of the coun-
try.
By 1953 the university was scat-
tered among 50 rented buildings
throughout Jerusalem. Conditions
of work were difficult in the ex-
treme, and it became imperative tl
build new premises. The result was
the campus at Givat Ram and the
medical center at EM Karem
Campus.
The Hebrew University has since
its beginnings sought to further
human progress everywhere. It has
provided experts needed to develop
Israel's agriculture and industry.
to safeguard its people's health, to
man its defense and administrative
posts and to chart its physical and
cultural development. Israel looks
to it for her future leaders, and
world Jewry regards it as a great
cultural reservoir.
The American Friends of the
Hebrew University was chartered
in 1931. It constitutes the univer-
sity's prime source of outside as-
sistance. The AFHU includes in its
original structure an Office of Aca-
demic Affairs, which conducts a
one-year study program for Amer-
ican college students at the uni-

THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS

18—Friday, November 13, 1970

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