Campaign for the Rappoports Successful!

The following announcement was sent via email on August 17, 2009:

WE DID IT!

It is with relief and deep gratitude to the devoted network of alumni, parents, students and friends who make up the Yale Jewish Community at large that I am pleased to announce: The emergency campaign to raise the funds necessary to keep the Rappoport Family employed at Yale for one last year has been successful.

In the few short weeks since our plea went out in June, we raised just over $120,000 in cash and pledges – a testament to our community’s appreciation of the need to provide exceptional support for current Yale students.

Thanks to the generous donors who stepped forward, we will benefit from the unique and wonderful energies of the Rappoport family for one more year as part of the diverse and passionate rabbinic staff of Joseph Slifka Center – a group united by a commitment to help Yale students (and sometimes faculty) deepen their own connection to Judaism, supporting individuals and their personal growth over any particular affiliation or halachic choices.

In speaking with students and alumni during this campaign, it is clear that, while the Rappoports have concrete and particular importance to the observant community in Jason’s role as Orthodox Rabbi, their legacy and daily work speak loudly of their devotion to a Jewish community woven of innumerable and distinct threads.  Indeed, it is that same complex community that came together – from all corners of the world, and from across the spectrum of Jewish affiliation – to ensure that the Yale community would benefit from the presence of the Rappoports and JLIC this year.

The legions of undergraduates arriving in just a few days (and graduate students, faculty, etc.) will begin this new year at Yale with the limitless sense of Jewish possibilities that Slifka Center’s inimitable rabbinic staff  provides – undiminished by the economic climate.

It will be an interesting year – there is much to accomplish, not least of which will be the search for a successor to Rabbi Rappoport.  We hope you will add your voice to the conversation as we discuss the future of Jewish life at Yale, and the particular complexities of providing for observant life in a pluralistic community at a secular institution.

Sincerely,
Shana Katz Ross
Director of Development

Many thanks to our alumni, students and friends who made this possible.

We were able to raise enough to keep the Rappoport Family employed for Academic Year 2009-2010.  We did not raise all the funds needed to maintain the levels of programming that had previously been supported by the Seif Jewish Learning Initiative on Campus, and will continue to be grateful for donations specifically designated for orthodox life.

Please click here to make a donation to directly support this worthy cause.

Want to make a gift by check, stock transfer, or other means?  Click here for instructions on the ways to make a gift to Slifka Center.