Hillary Blank is a senior in the College of Arts and Sciences, majoring in Jewish Studies with a Jazz Performance Minor. She has dreams to become a Cantor after graduating. She is from San Diego, California and is current president of JSA, after holding several other roles on board in past terms.
How did you get involved in the Jewish Student Association?
I got involved with AU’s Jewish Student Association (JSA) the very first week of my freshman year when JSA kick-started my social life. During welcome week, JSA sponsored a “Limo Ride Scavenger Hunt” that promised to take dozens of freshmen to exciting spots around DC. Like most freshmen, I couldn’t think of much else better to do during welcome week (besides stroll the sketchy frat parties) so I wandered over to the meeting place and hoped for the best. The night turned out to be (literally) the ride of my college life. I had an incredible time and met the coolest upperclassmen and JSA board members, along with some great freshmen. In fact, I met my best friend and roommate that night!
I attended as many Hillel and JSA events as I could for the rest of Welcome Week, and decided to get involved in leadership in the Jewish community in a small way. My best friend and I chaired the “First Year Students @ Hillel” (FYSH) group for a whole semester. Meanwhile, I started to understand that bigger and better leadership opportunities were available to me through the JSA Executive Board. During the semester, then-president of JSA, Leah, had become a friend and mentor, and she strongly encouraged me to run for the position of Religious, Education and Cultural (REC) Director on the board. I ran, won, and the rest is history!
I’ve been on and off the board, and when I wasn’t on board (or attending events regularly) I truly missed being involved in the planning of the events. Being “involved” with JSA for me has always meant really making things happen. I’m thrilled to be President with a team of dynamic leaders who are just as excited to continue JSA’s tradition of planning fun, engaging events.
What kind of events or programming does JSA do?
JSA has several takes on what effective, good programming is. As a board, we always try to stick to our mission of providing a variety of fun and educational programs for the entire campus Jewish community, whether those programs are religious, cultural, social or some combination thereof. During Welcome Week in the fall, we host a few social lounge events, and also co-sponsor Hillel’s “Welcome Back BBQ.” This past fall, we held one of the most exciting and innovative new events I have ever seen JSA plan, the first annual JSA “Bar Mitzvah Bash.” We packed over 150 AU students into a huge open space on campus, hired a DJ, cut up some sheet cake and danced to the ’90’s music we all remember from our Bar Mitzvah years. The event had fabulous co-sponsorship with the campus’ Women’s Initiative group and held a raffle that was supported by toiletry donations, and we also presented an educational play/poem about the typical embarrassment of the Bar Mitzvah experience. That night was one of the most fun evening’s I’ve spent with JSA, and I can’t wait to throw another Bar Mitzvah Party again next fall.
We also host a variety of other events with more focused attendance and purpose. We’ve hosted panels about GLBT relations with the Jewish community, held talks on the Jewish concept of the afterlife and sponsored themed Havdallah’s many times. Holidays are another focus — JSA has an annual Chanukah party and an annual Purim party, and we also throw a mean series of events, like tabling and seders for Tu B’Shevat. Also, every spring semester we host “Holocaust Remembrance Week” on campus, an enormous task that results in a great deal of campus involvement and includes such events as movie nights, bone marrow bank drives, GLBT presentations, art projects, name readings and more. Finally, we do our best to support other Jewish life-related groups on campus by co-sponsoring events when possible.
JSA programming covers every Jewish programming base I can imagine, and every year the program gets a fresh new look and a new take on tradition!
How has JSA changed since you first encountered it?
When I first encountered JSA, one of its toughest dilemmas was trying to incorporate new students into its circle of friendship. The board was a wonderful, charged group of leaders who had some crazy-awesome friendships, but I think it was hard at first for such close friends to open up their circle and let in the huge campus Jewish community. Now, I see JSA as a group that is not clique-free, but rather a group with many, many different cliques that all get different things out of events. Being aware of the power of cliques and circles of friendships has opened JSA up to true innovation in the way of campus programming.
What is the difference between JSA and Hillel?
This question is actually the #1 Frequently Asked Question that I get as a Jewish campus leader. The explanation is a bit complicated but I think I’ve got it down… *ahem* let’s see…
Every AU student pays an “activities fee” (one of many lovely fees at our private school) around $80 each year. A portion of that money goes to the AU Club Council, and the board of that council divides that money among student clubs on campus once each year. Of the more than 100 clubs on campus, JSA is in the top ten on the list of who receives how much money. Every December, we elected a new Executive board and a new General board and the following fall, that board is charged with applying for a new budget. In this way, JSA never misses a beat with programming or budgeting. We use student money to do student programming, and pretty much stick to on-campus events that target AU Jewish students on their home turf.
American University Hillel is housed in our campus’ Kay Spiritual Life Center, which is home to more than 23 different religious campus ministries. AU Hillel has an executive director (who is also our campus rabbi), a programming director, a Jewish Campus Service Corps (JCSC) representative and a few fellows. While “ministry” is certainly a misnomer for Hillel as religious services is only one small piece of its programming, AU Hillel does act as the umbrella Jewish organization on campus. Instead of having a student board for Hillel, AU Hillel incorporates student organizations such as JSA, AU Students for Israel, and more into its scope of planning and student involvement. Hillel does sometimes put on similar programs to those that JSA sponsors, but for the most part Hillel takes care of programming far beyond the scope of any student organization. AU Hillel sponsors trips to Jewish communities all over the world, hosts regular Shabbat services, brings Jewish educators to campus and more, and meanwhile advises JSA on how to best do Jewish campus engagement.
AU Hillel is kind of like JSA’s older brother or sister — sometimes Hillel is an advisor, sometimes it’s an endorser and sometimes it’s a co-sponsoring friend. We are partners in reaching out to the Jewish community, but also in engaging Jewish campus leadership and listening to the needs and desires of Jewish students on campus.
Where do you see JSA going in the future?
Hopefully, I see JSA going the way of the Jewish community on campus in the future. AU’s Jewish community is growing by leaps and bounds. In the past few years, we have moved from having Kosher for Passover meals for two meal plan swipes and once a week $12 Shabbat meals, to now having Kosher lunches and dinners available at several dining locations on campus for either a meal swipe or a reasonable price, and less expensive Kosher for Pesach and Shabbat meals and meal plans. This is just one example of a facet of Jewish life on campus that is growing enormously.
What I hope to see from JSA is a true embracement of the variety of Jewish identities present on campus. Just as JSA is starting to incorporate more religious and Jewish learning events in our yearly calendarizing, we also plan to incorporate other perspectives on Judaism into our programs. Whether we are discussing Humanistic Judaism, Jewish-Israel identities, Jewish comedy or some other aspect of Jewish identity, I hope that we draw more Jewish students to our events and open our arms to new members of the community.