<p>Union of Reform Judaism each year puts out a list of the schools with the most Jewish students.</p>
<p>The CMU/Pitt Hillel has Parents Circles at three levels, two of which include a “Chicken Soup Hotline”. I signed up for it one year and DS did get sick once and had soup delivered - when I called it in I asked for it to be delivered by a nice Jewish girl - not sure if that happened! But it’s $80 extra and DS said the soup was not that good!</p>
<p>Lergnom, do you happen to have a link to that list?</p>
<p>QM, here you go: <a href=“http://reformjudaismmag.org/_kd/Items/actions.cfm?action=Show&item_id=1380&destination=ShowItem[/url]”>http://reformjudaismmag.org/_kd/Items/actions.cfm?action=Show&item_id=1380&destination=ShowItem</a></p>
<p>Thank you, Booklady. I’ll check it out.</p>
<p>Another one:</p>
<p>U of Oregon (D1 went, I didn’t) apparently has a nice and active Hillel. </p>
<p>interesteddad, thanks for the correction on the Swat Hillel location. To someone who’d never been there before, it felt a little distant, especially as the campus is so large.</p>
<p>mmaah, that article about Jewish life at Whitman made me appreciate how different kids are going to want different levels of Jewish activity at a school. This wouldn’t be right for D1 (a pity, since other aspects of the school might be very attractive), but I can see that it would be just right for other kids. </p>
<p>The Hillel website is useful but not the source of all answers. D1 really enjoys Israeli dancing, so I used the Hillel website to find campuses that offered Israeli dance as a first cut. That only goes so far without knowing more about the personality of the Jewish community at the campus. For instance, both Bryn Mawr and Brown popped up when looking for a campus with 11 to 25% Jewish population and having Israeli dance. Yet Brown has a much more vibrant Jewish community than Bryn Mawr. It’s an enormous help to have any anecdotal reports about Jewish life on campus from CC members. Same deal with the Reform list. Excellent starting point for D1’s search, but her experience when looking at Reed shows high percentage doesn’t necessarily mean lots of Jewish activity. </p>
<p>Maybe a new first cut for D1 should be “School has t-shirts with school name in Hebrew.” :)</p>
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<p>LOL That would have absolutely worked for my D! Reminds me of a Jewish friend’s D who didn’t know her Stanford boyfriend was Jewish until she saw him wearing a “Stanford” in Hebrew t-shirt. (Of course, just wearing it didn’t mean he was Jewish, but it prompted her to ask.)</p>
<p>I had the same reservations about the Hillel website - I found several listings to be out of date and incorrect.</p>
<p>The Hillel at the U of Wisconsin-Madison just opened a new building which is gorgeous. Truly amazing. I’ve seen the outside and hope to go inside when I visit in a couple of weeks. Their website says they serve 5000 Jewish students (the URJ site says 4000, but UW may include grad students and/or faculty?). There are a multitude of activities, services for various denominations, a rooftop deck, a fitness center, kosher meal plan or kitchen of some sort, etc…
[Home</a> - Hillel Foundation University of Wisconsin](<a href=“http://www.uwhillel.org/site/pp.asp?c=ceIGKTMHF&b=131935]Home”>http://www.uwhillel.org/site/pp.asp?c=ceIGKTMHF&b=131935)</p>
<p>My son, who comes from a very small Jewish community (I can count the number of Jewish kids at his high school on my fingers and 4 of them are related to me - sons and nieces - LOL) so he loves simply sharing the college experience with so many other Jewish kids. He appreciates the social/cultural connection the most, I think. He has not gotten particularly involved with Hillel so far (only been there a few weeks) and is not super observant, but did go to Erev Rosh Hashanah services last Friday night and thought they were really good. I was able to send a “New Year’s” box to him with apples/honey, snacks and other little stuff. They DO have gear with school name written in Hebrew. </p>
<p>All in all, they seem to offer a lot to students. The size helps meet the needs/interests of everyone from Reform to Orthodox.</p>
<p>I’ll share what I know: U of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign last year opened a terrific new Hillel building. They have 3 services Friday nights, several choices of Seders for Passover, and many active students. They also will bring chicken soup to your ailing student. ;)</p>
<p>If this thread is becoming a listing, BU has a terrific Hillel which has both meat and a dairy meal service which you can select as a meal plan. </p>
<p>And there’s a Chabad House between a tanning salon and an MIT frat in Kenmore Sq.</p>
<p>stillnadine–my s is a sophomore at Washington and Lee and the groundbreaking for the new Hillel house was last week. The school and its alumni donors seem very committed to creating a center for Jewish life. The numbers of Jewish students remain small however they have a dedicated director of the Hillel who is warm and available to the students, they have First Fridays, a shabbat service and dinner, bagel brunches, build a sukkah, and have ongoing events throughout the year which my son is involved in. He is on a full ride at W & L and he himself is committed to diversifying the school…</p>
<p>In the world of small liberal arts colleges or nonflagship state schools in states with small Jewish populations, there may be schools to avoid, but has anyone heard of any?</p>
<p>I also wonder if being in a small minority helps some Jewish kids from largely Jewish areas become more in touch with their Jewishness than they had been in high school</p>
<p>To make it easier, you can go on-line to the college web site and see if there is a Hillel and look up the activities to see if your child may have interest before putting the college on the tour list.</p>
<p>Yabeyabe 2, My kids’ experience, through high school, is just as you describe. By being a super minority (at most 6 Jewish students out of 1200), they really “owned” their Jewishness in ways that kids from Jewish areas may take for granted.</p>
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<p>At Cornell, students who are keeping kosher can eat with their non-kosher friends in one of the large dining halls in the freshman dorm neighborhood. I think, though, that few upperclassmen would eat there because the location is not convenient to most of the places where upperclassmen live. There’s no rule preventing upperclassmen from eating in that dining hall, but I think that upperclassmen who are keeping kosher would be more likely to eat in the all-kosher dining hall on the other side of the campus, while their non-kosher friends would eat at other facilities.</p>
<p>Williams has a beautiful Jewish Students Union. It’s one of my favorite buildings on campus. And our admissions session was held there. It’s one of the things that convinced S he preferred it to Amherst where the info session was in a plush carpeted room with fancy leather chairs.</p>
<p>It’s not because we’re practicing Jews (we’re not) or even the Jewish connection, but he liked the wood floors, wooden chairs and folksy atmosphere.</p>
<p>He just told me that two of his classes are canceled on Monday. </p>
<p>I don’t think Williams would be a school people would associate with vibrant Jewish life, but it does have some.</p>
<p>[Edward</a> H. Rosen Center for Jewish Life at Temple University](<a href=“http://templehillel.com/ehrc]Edward”>http://templehillel.com/ehrc)</p>
<p>D. had to talk to each prof to let them know that she is not coming to class on Monday for very serious reason. She was allowed to take a test for one of them on Wednesday instead. However, none of the classes are cancelled, it is OK, at least profs were OK with her requests.</p>
<p>The Ohio State University is another large state flagship U. with an active Jewish student community and a really nice Hillel center. When I visited it, with D1 back in '07, we were both impressed.</p>
<p>[Hillel</a> at the Ohio State University | Wexner Jewish Student Center](<a href=“http://osuhillel.org/about_wexner.php]Hillel”>http://osuhillel.org/about_wexner.php)</p>
<p>My son is a freshman at CMU, and he came down with the swine flu. He was quarantined for a few days (he’s fine now).
I called Chabad and they very graciously brought him chicken soup twice while he was quarrantined. I gave them a donation aftewards to thank them, but it was not necessary.</p>