This Week

Insight

En`rich'ing Young Jewish Lives

U-Al Hitters Rabbi Rich Kirschen accepts directorship in Rhode Island.

SHELLI LIEBMAN DORFMAN
Stair Writer

I

asked Rich Kirschen to come to work with us at
University of Michigan Hillel three minutes after I
met him five years ago," recalls Michael Brooks,
executive director of the Hillel Foundation at U-M.
As Rabbi Richard Kirschen readies to leave his position as
U-M's associate Hillel director to become executive director
of the Brown University-Rhode Island School of Design
Hillel Foundation in Providence at the end of this month,
he looks back upon his time at I: M.
"It has been a most remarkable five years," he says of the
post he took just m3riths following his 1996 ordination
from Hebrew Union College-Jerusalem Institute of
Religion (HUC-JIR) in New York.
"I had a lot of fun here. Both the staff and the students were
amazing," says Rabbi Rich, as he is typically called by students.
"I always knew I wanted to work in informal education,"
he says. "I always wanted to work with college-age or post-
college-age students during that crucial time in their lives
when They are figuring out their identity"
He says pinpointing who is touched by Hillel can't always
be measured by counting participants attending a lecture or
a religious service. "We can have a Torah study for 15 peo-
ple or a program with Dennis Ross for 800 or a talk by Dr.
Ruth for 1,500."
Many are affected more by a relationship or an experience
than by words, he says.
"One of my favorite students is a guy who went to tem-
ple until his bar mitzvah and had no formal Jewish life. He
came on a Hillel-Israel trip and we stayed in touch," he
says. "I know he never thought he would be connected
with a Jewish community, but he is."

A Fine Educator

Says director Brool ;: "Rich is a first-rate Hillel professional
who also happens to be an outstanding post-denomination-
al Reform rabbi. Students have resonated with him from
the first day he arrived on campus, in part because he takes
them and their issues seriously, but never takes himself too
seriously."
"I met Rabbi Rich at the kick-off Shabbat my junior
year," says Megan Nesbitt of Ann Arbor. "He had just start-
ed here. He encouraged me to be more active in the Jewish
community and to learn more about Judaism. He gave me
direction and connected me to Hillel." She has been
involved in the organization ever since.
Chosen as last year's Berman Fellow, she worked at U-M
Hillel in a one-year fellowship program established by phi-
lanthropist Mandell L. Berman of Franklin to help young
Jewish leaders prepare for Jewish communal positions.
"After graduation, I started working here. I couldn't let it
go, mostly because of Rabbi Rich," she says.

"Working at Hillel is a pretty special kind of niche within
the Jewish world," Rabbi Kirschen says.
He describes his position as being multifaceted. "I was a
number of things here: a teacher, a counselor, a program-
mer — part rabbi, part air-traffic controller," he says of the
organization that serves any of the 6,000 Jewish U-M stu-
dents interested in Hillel programming.

Remember
When

From the pages of the Jewish News for
this week 10, 20, 30, 40 and 50
years ago.

1991

The boards of congregations Beth
Achim and B'nai Moshe voted to
merge the two synagogues.
An Israeli tourist in northern
India was killed in a gun battle
with Kashmiri Muslim separatists.
A plot to assassinate Israeli
President Chaim Herzog in
Budapest was foiled by Hungarian
and Israeli security agents.

1981

A French Jewish pilot was dis-
missed by UTA airlines for refusing
to .fly a cargo of weapons to Libya.
Detroiter Avon Blitz was installed
as president of the Helen Rosenberg
Cancer Fighters of the City of Hope.

1971

Rabbi Kirschen, left, stands in the Mandell L. Berman Center
in Ann Arbor with Josh. Charm of New Jersey, a recent U-M
graduate, at the dedication of a Torah in memory of former
U-M student Benjamin Brownfain.

What's Next?

Finding his choice of work "great and crucial to the Jewish
community," Rabbi Kirschen looks forward to continuing
his work in a new venue.
Choosing to move was a difficult decision. "My family loves
Ann Arbor," he says of his wife, Cara Saposnik, a documentary
film consultant, and their children Gili, 7; Liron, 4; and Ayal 1.
Rabbi Shena Potter, ordained in May from HUC-JIR in
Cincinnati has been selected this year's Berman Fellow,
beginning in August, with Nesbitt pursuing Jewish commu-
nal work in Chicago. Rabbi Potter will become assistant
director of U-M Hillel the following year.
"Rabbi Kirschen's vision of Jewish possibilities and his
indefatigable energy have left an indelible mark on the cul-
ture of Jewish life at Michigan and he will be sorely
missed," Brooks says.
In a farewell e-mail to students, Rabbi Kirschen shared his
feelings of sadness at leaving and described his new post. At
the end of the letter, he wrote to them: "In the words of
Rabbi Hanina (Masechet Ta'anit): 'I have learnt much from
my teachers — and from my colleagues more than from my
teachers. But from my students more than from them all.'" 0

Rabbi David Polish of Evanston, Ill.,
was elected president of the Central
Conference of American Rabbis.
An Israeli forest sponsored by the
Dutch people was dedicated in mem-
ory of the late Queen Wilhelmina in
the hills outside Nazareth.
Rabbi William Schostak of
Brooklyn, a former Detroiter, pub-
lished a tract of family laws. -

Israel Foreign Minister Golda Meir
called in Gen. C.C. von Horn, chief
of the United Nations Truce
Supervision Organization, to discuss
the situation of the Syrian border.
Marilyn Lucas of Detroit received
the National Federation of Music
Clubs scholarship to Tanglewood
Music Center in Lenox, Mass.

Rabbi Benjamin Lowell was ousted
as spiritual leader of a suburban New
York congregation under charges of
having pro-Communist ties.
The remains of Dr. Nachman
Syrkin, a founder of the Zionist
Labor Party, were scheduled to be
moved from New York to Israel for
reburial. He died in 1924.
The transport of Jews from Iran
to Israel was started by airplane.

— Compiled by Sy Manello,
editorial assistant

7/6

2001

27