Before Jessica Sibelman came to Temple this Fall as a junior, she went to school in Boston at the New England Conservatory, studying clarinet. She’s been playing the instrument for seven years, and transferred to Temple to learn in the studio of Ricardo Morales , principal clarinet of the Philadelphia Orchestra, and lecturer on the instrument at Temple. Sibelman especially enjoys playing the romantic music from 19th century composer/musician Johannes Brahms, and after she graduates wants to either play in an orchestra or chamber. But the clarinet isn’t the only thing Jessica does. Even though she’s only in her second semester at Temple, Jessica is a member of Alpha Epsilon Phi, and a delegate in the Panhellenic Association, which has one delegate from each of the three sororities: Alpha Epsilon Phi, Delta Zeta, and Phi Sigma Sigma. Silberman participated in an interview by e-mail this week with CampusJ.

What do you do as delegate? How did you get involved?
We all have individual positions, so right now I’m Philanthropy Chair, so I’m planning on doing a clothing drive or visiting a hospital. Just something where all the sororities can get together and do some community service together.
I was nominated for the position and I decided it would be really nice to get involved on campus. And, you know, meeting 70 girls is awesome, but meeting 200 new girls is awesome too.
What do you like most about being a delegate?
I like being the philanthropy chair, because it really got me on the computer researching all the different organizations in Philadelphia, and what we could do. I just found the Purple Heart Foundation, where they can just pick up your stuff, and donate to homeless people and stuff like that, so we’re going to do a clothing drive.
What challenges have you faced?
Really no major challenges, I guess just maybe to figure out how all of us can get involved together. There’s so many girls and we want to get as many girls involved as we can around the campus, so just scheduling I guess.
What sticks out in your mind about your experiences as a delegate?
You know I think it’s really just meeting all these girls, because I’ve always been like kind of a tomboy, and you know I play clarinet, so I used to just like completely go that way, and practice all day long. And, this really got me outside of he box; it really got to meet new people, do things I never thought I would do, so it was really nice.
How do you incorporate Judaism in your life?
Well, I’m actually working with Rabbi Lynn from UPenn right now, and he wants to bring a new program to Temple that’s a little bit different than Hillel or the Jewish Heritage Programs. He wants it to be a mix of both where it’s like a social event, but more learning about the customs and traditions of Judaism. We kind of met while I was working in the SAC, and starting talking about it, and I’ll kind of help him launch this program in the fall semester. I’m not terribly, terribly religious, but I do care about the values and traditions of Judaism, so I just think it’s good to have it on campus, where we can get more people involved, Because he told me there was 2,000 Jews on campus and personally, I think I met maybe 40. There just so many of us, and if we can find a really good program to get us all together, I think we can find a lot more Jewish people and build it into something stronger.