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JVS: A Major
Jewish Agency
In response to your Editor's Notebook
("A March To Remember," Aug. 29,
page 5), you mention, 'An important
Detroit job placement and training
agency JVS, has Jewish roots." We
appreciate your reference to our services
and would like to clarify that JVS has
more than Jewish roots. We are a Jewish
agency
JVS has been a constituent member of
the Jewish Federation of Metropolitan
Detroit since our founding as Jewish
Vocational Service in 1941. We are, in
fact, the only Jewish human service
agency that still operates in Detroit.
Our mission is to help people meet
life challenges affecting their self-suffi-
ciency through counseling, training and
support services in accordance with
Jewish values of equal opportunity, corn-
passion, responsibility and the steadfast
belief that the best way to help people is
to make it possible for them to help
themselves.
In keeping with this mission, last year,
JVS served 30,000 people: assisting job
seekers, individuals with disabilities, the
frail elderly, at-risk youth and others
from locations in Detroit, West
Bloomfield and Southfield, putting the
practice of tikkun olam (repair of the
world) into practice.
Liz Kanter Groskind
chair, JVS Board of Trustees
Southfield
U-M Diversity
Plan Is A Farce
vj&
9/12
2003
6
It is extremely unlikely that the U.S.
Supreme Court, in striking down the
University of Michigan's undergraduate
point-based admissions program, envi-
sioned the university's latest version of a
legitimate system.
The new program now demands
financial information concerning the
applicant's family and four essays — two
of which have to be on diversity! Can
you imagine the chances of a student
being admitted if he or she has the
unmitigated honesty and gall to write
that he thinks the whole diversity idea is
a phony bit of social engineering, the
results of which are at best questionable
and reek of reverse discrimination?
How about financial divulgence? Is
the child whose parents have been bright
enough and hard working enough to
obtain some financial success in the
world to be punished?
What about the requirement that the
student obtain an expanded counselor
and teacher recommendation, including
the applicant's ability to interact with
different groups? Does the student who
sucks up to the interviewer and gives
him or her the answers that they know
is expected suddenly become the best
prospect for success in the university
academic program?
Then each applicant will get an
expanded review by "part-time" readers
and a separate review by a U-M admis-
sions counselor. Is there any doubt that
those will be picked who will totally
conform to this socially engineered pro-
totype that the university has been
defending tooth and nail with millions
of dollars of taxpayer money and
coerced donations from major corpora-
tions and foundations afraid of being
labeled the bad guy?
Of course, the worst part of the whole
scenario is the shocking diminishment
of the requirement of plain old merit
and the studied avoidance of the previ-
ous record of achievement in the whole
contrived evaluation.
Practically nowhere is it mentioned
that the good bright student who has a
proven record of brains and accomplish-
ment should be rewarded and trained,
especially by a state and federally funded
institution, to ultimately represent this
country and continue our success in the
world. Are we hell-bent on becoming
another socialized, underachieving coun-
try in order to pacify those insanely jeal-
ous of us?
Jerome S. Kaufinan
Bloomfield Hills
Fight Terror
Ag gressive
It starts with Israel, a democracy among
Middle East dictatorships. These dicta-
torial governments consist of an assort-
ment of tyrants who rule with an iron
hand. Any dissent from their people is
quickly suppressed with either death or
imprisonment. They fear any kind of
free society. As long as these people rule,
there will be no lack of terror.
Just as Israel is targeting Hamas,
America must kill and terrorize these
leaders in the Middle East and set all of
their citizens free. If this administration
thought that by getting rid of Iraq's
Saddam Hussein it would solve the ter-
rorist problem, it was naive. You cannot
remove only a little cancer. If you do, it
will only continue to grow until it final-
ly kills you. We know the terrorist
nations and who their leaders are; it is
time to give them some of their own
medicine. The best defense is a good
offense. The idea of putting a guard in
front of every building in America is
impossible:
Robert Leaf
the City. This and similar tikkun olam
projects are vital aspects of what we
teach.
Rabbi Norman Roman
Farmington Hills
West Bloomfield
Knowing History
Arms Students
Course New,
Not Revised
Burton Zipser's letter about the impor-
tance of teaching Jewish history in
Jewish day and congregational schools is
right on (Are Jewish Schools On Right
Course?" Aug. 29, page 6). Common
history texts glamorize the period of the
Crusades and our students need to put
that in the context of what was happen-
ing to Jews at the time.
The Dreyfus affair may be briefly
mentioned in history texts, but our stu-
dents need to understand that it led
Theodor Herzl to found the modern
Zionist movement. Our students need
to be armed to defend themselves
against Holocaust deniers and those
who try to de-legitimize Israel. They
can only do so by learning Jewish histo-
ry
The principal of Yeshivat Akiva, Rabbi
Yigal Tsaidi, said that while there is a
need to compress subjects in a dual pro-
gram school like Akiva (religious and
secular), he has included Jewish history
in the curriculum. The course is tau ght
by someone well versed in the subject.
If there are day or congregational
schools that have a void in this subject
matter, they would do well to correct
this so that a new generation of Jewish
youth will continue to know where we
come from, what we've done and what
has happened to us. Knowing the past
has been a solidifying force for our peo-
ple through the millennia.
Erwin H. Posner
In a letter about the Farmington school
district's International Affairs course,
("Trust Called For In Farmington
Schools," Aug. 29, page 6), North
Farmington High School counselor Jane
Reiser Williams referred to it as a
"renamed" version of an existing course.
Although the Farmington schools pre-
viously offered a class called
International Issues, the currently taught
International Affairs class was created,
according to the original curriculum
proposal, some time around March
2003. It was created as one of three, or
possibly six, new classes (depending
upon different statements made by Dr.
C. Robert Maxfield, superintendent of
schools) to be developed to satisfy a new
graduation requirement.
Shortly before this new curriculum
was to be voted upon by the school
board, a few of the changes requested by
concerned parents were made. The cur-
riculum is still undergoing changes,
according to the district.
Although it may contain some of the
material covered in International Issues
class, the current International Affairs
class is not merely a revision of that ear-
lier class.
On its Web site, the Farmington
school district, in a document tided
"Executive Summary — International
Affairs Class," stated "the district has a
variety of strategies that can be imple-
mented to support the thoughtful deliv-
ery of a new course."
Also, in his Sept. 4 commentary in
the Farmington Observer, Dr. Maxfield
repeats the statement quoted above
referring to International Affairs as a
"new course," and writes of the "adop-
tion" of the course, not of its revision.
Now the school district is soliciting
students to praise the International
Issues class and argue that it is the same
as International Affairs. If it really is the
same class, why did the school board
vote 4-3 to adopt an entirely new cur-
riculum?
Any confusion of the issue is the
product of the district's attempt to justi-
fy going forward with a new curriculum
before it was properly developed. I
would certainly be interested in hearing
any evidence to the contrary.
A. Saree Hander
Southfield
Kol Ami Proud
Of City Activists
Thanks for last week's cover story high-
lighting some young Jewish college stu-
dents who initiated and coordinated the
Summer in the City program ("313
Calling," Sept. 5, page 52).
With great pride, however, I hasten to
point out to the community that both
Ben Falik and Michael Goldberg
received their entire formal religious
education, celebrated bar mitzvah and
were active in the youth programs at
Temple Kol Ami. Their respective fami-
lies have been leading members of our
congregation for more than 15 years.
Indeed, several other Temple Kol Ami
students have participated in Summer ir'
Farmington Hills