Yale
Club of Israel Planning Committee
Meeting Summary
Nov. 29, 2005
Attending: David Mirchin, Phil
Waldoks, Matt Minoff, Nurit Altura, Pennina and Hershel Safer, Ashok C.,
Matt Mausner, Carice Witte, Louis Rowen
Last
event - We formalized the alumni concert as an
annual event. The target date for the next performance is Sept.
'06. We agreed that it's a great way to start the year. We
also agreed to stick to Yale musicians only - at least until we run
out. We'll let the other clubs be part of the audience.
I'll oversee the logistics with the assistance of Louis Rowen and
hopefully Rebecca Kopans who couldn't make it to the meeting. We
expect Louis (cello), Ashok (piano), Orrin (vocal) to participate as
well as other club talent. If anyone has suggestions, please let
me know.
Next
Event - Thurs., Jan. 19th wine
tasting and private tour of the castel winery by the owner arranged by
Ari Zalkinder. Then coffee and cake at Ari's to recover enough to
make the harrowing drive down the mountain - at least for those of us
heading west. Space is strictly limited to 26 people and 10
cars. 5 rsvp's resulted from the meeting.
AYA
Assembly - Ashok is our new club/country rep. for
which we are all eternally grateful. Throughout the rest of the
meeting Ashok briefed us on what he learned as it serendipitously came
up in the context of each agenda topic. See below for Ashok's AYA
Assembly notes.
International
Club Program - spearheaded by David Mirchin, the idea
is that yale alumni around the world are
interested in meeting alumni from Israel - specifically because Israel is very interesting. They're
excited about the chance to have an insider's view on this perennially
hot news topic AKA Israel. They're happy to host casual
encounters such as lunch or 'coffee' where the Israel based alum discusses anything from
daily life in this misunderstood country to geo-politics depending on
your interest and bent. Yale Club of Israel alumni don't need to
be any kind of expert. Just living here makes us expert enough.
Club member Matt Mausner, '96, met with the Yale
Club of Bergen County this summer. The feedback was great. They
were very interested in hearing about daily life, politics, etc.
Matt felt it certainly helped them gain a bit of perspective. In
the upcoming newsletter we intend to invite alumni to
participate. Anyone interested simply has to let David know at
least two weeks in advance of their trip to Europe, Asia or the
States. David will coordinate with a Yale club in the appropriate
locale. David is contacting our AYA territory representative to see how
she can help out regarding contacting clubs.
Club Website
Ashok related that AYA finds club members
respond better to emails then general postings. While we're well
aware of that, we thought posting the year's calendar, now that we
finally worked one out, might be useful. We also agreed that all
notices, regardless of what they are, should include our website in the
signature. We also agreed we have to be more organized about
getting digital photos of activities and events for the site.
'Other
Possible Events' discussion
Ashok briefed us
on my favorite fun fact of the evening - When Ashok informed clubs of
boston, etc. about our club, they informed him that by USA and other
country club standards, turnout to Yale Club of Israel events is what
to be envious of. They may do more but we do it better.
Event
ideas we decided to pursue for this year:
Gallery
Opening at Dan Chill's Gallery. Dan has a gallery of Naïve
Art in TA. David's already contacted him and received a positive
answer for June. Dan, owner and curator, will give open the
gallery in the evening for the yale club gang and give us a private
talk on the history of the gallery, how he left the law to pursue this
off beat genre etc. then we'll all go out to eat in some
interesting little place (kosher).
Bahai/Picnic
in Carmel
Forest - not only did
my alumni survey many months ago get a strong thumbs up, but the crowd
at the meeting all were very enthusiastic. We plan on having that event
during Pesach. byofood etc. to avoid kashruth issues. We
all agreed that the club should do one event every year or two that
includes kids. This event would satisfy that goal.
Basketball - last year we talked
about it but this year we're doing it. Our resident super-tall
alumni jock, Matt Minoff is organizing tickets for the Feb. 12th
home game (Rishon) against Maccabi TA. Another fun family event
and easy to organize.
Yale
Faculty - Hershel is following up on his
suggestions of Ivan Marcus, Yale Judaic Studies prof, about his
upcoming visit. The other two are coming in the summer; He'll write to
them in March. Ashok informed us that there is an AYA program
that pays for a faculty member to visit 1 club a year such that every
club enjoys a faculty visit per year. I’m going to research that one.
(sounds too good to be true. Probably only valid for continental usa
or greater new haven.)
Visiting
Undergrads - Hershel offered to be in touch with Amy Aaland of Yale
Hillel to find out generally when there might be undergrads here and
specifically the arrival dates of the birthright crowd. If
and when, we'll arrange an event along the lines of our very successful
past experiences.
The
Importance of Being Earnest - Matt Mausner is performing. We’ll put
out a notice and get a group to attend together
Anyone who has
info of
other alum performances please let me know.
Ashok told of AYA advice
on events. They suggested something popular and successful
amongst clubs is some kind of community service project followed by a
meal or party where everyone could share their immediate experience and
generally socialize. Brainstorming non-partisan solutions led
Louis Rowen to suggest an Election Supervisor Event.
Election
Supervisors - interested club members would volunteer
to supervise 1 shift (all around the same time) of the election for the
party of their choice. After their shift, they’d all meet
somewhere for drinks and socializing. Someone volunteered my
house. That would be fine w/me.
We all agreed it's
so far
out it might actually be fun. We also agreed we might need a
special email/invitation to explain it and get the logistics in order.
Ashok is collecting some information about how to become an election
supervisor. We'll see how it goes from there.
We agreed that 4-5
main
events plus a few smaller gatherings for the year is ideal.
This year's events
-
alumni concert, wine tasting, gallery opening, Bahai/Picnic, and
possibly the election supervisors fling.
Additional
Ideas
Michael
Oren - author of The 6 Day War and a new
book soon to appear at bookstores everywhere about US involvement in
the mid-east since 1776. He's known to be a top scholar and a
charismatic speaker. David Mirchin has already contacted him and
received a yes to speak to the yale club early next year. do we rock or
what?
Fruit
Picking - Matthew Mausner proposed everyone
come to carice's meshek and relieve her of hours on step ladders (or
was that my idea?). Actually, he suggested a cherry picking
event/party. He'll look into the details of what it would offer.
IPO
concert and dinner - tap into Miriam's connections
Israel Opera -
the art director is a
yale grad
who boycotts the club. But might still help us get a block of
discounted tickets.
Young
Alumni
We are going to
make
another attempt to put together a list of alumni from '98 to the
present. The young alumni attending the meeting indicated an
interest and might volunteer to organize events.
Summer
Internships
Ashok updated us
on AYA's
international internship program. While the new program
undoubtedly provides the participating lucky undergrad with a fantastic
experience, we ruled out participating in Yale's Special Summer Internships Abroad for
Undergraduates in that it requires a significant cash input
from the club sponsoring the intern to come to their country.
Nurit is looking into the Yavne program to see if we can connect some
interested undergrads to summers in Israel thru them. The
club is currently seeking a volunteer to head up our internship
section.
J-Branch
Nurit Altura, Coordinator
The idea is that
club
members in close proximity can enjoy a range of activities not
necessarily conducive to the wider club.
A number of
activity
ideas were suggested including walking tours, pub gatherings (perhaps
for the '98+ crowd?), local gallery openings, concerts, book club.
It would also be fun to get a group together to attend one of
Sandy Cash’s performances in a local Jerusalem comedy club.
Admissions
We discussed the
pros and
cons of encouraging Israelis to apply to Yale. I reported that
about a year and a half ago, Laura Shekar and I looked into increasing Israel's
# of annual yale applications. I relayed our conversations with the
head of admissions for our territory. Basically they find our
candidates very interesting but often weak in writing skills.
They feel no great motivation to actively recruit any more than they
currently do which entails a visit here every 4-5yrs.
During the meeting
we
discussed one of the key issues, lack of awareness of the option of a
Yale education and understanding of what that truly means.
Israeli understanding of college does not encompass the concept of
'yale'. Should more qualified student apply, we
expect there would be a higher acceptance level. Nonetheless,
only 1 of the 22 who applied for the class of '09 was accepted.
I reported that I
was
contacted by Michal Berris, an MIT grad a few months ago regarding
increasing student awareness. She sent the following:
The US-Israel
Foundation in Tel Aviv acts as clearinghouse for Israeli students
interested in studying in the US. They also organize 2
hour information sessions on Friday mornings to present various
universities and answer questions. Due to the low number of Israeli
undergraduate applicants to Ivy League schools I suggested that MIT, Princeton, Harvard and Yale conduct a joint
session.
Yale, represented
by ASC
Director, Alex Rechter, Harvard, Princeton,
and MIT made presentations to about 150 parents and prospective
applicants at the Nov. 18th event (will include alex's
event comments in the upcoming newsletter) During the club meeting the only
conclusion we reached was that a serious recruitment effort would
require committing time and energy as well as someone to spearhead the
effort. No one volunteered.
AYA
Assembly Notes from Ashok
Club Activities
Representatives of about 20
local Yale Clubs met in a session moderated by two AYA people (didn't
get their names). Here were some of the key points raise:
1. Specific email announcements
work better than general newsletters or web postings.
2. Good web resources:
surveymonkey.com, constantcontact.com.
3. Yale professors are going to
start booking all travel through a central office, and AYA will try to
use that as a way of monitoring their plans and alerting local clubs.
4. AYA supposedly pays for one
professor visit to each club per year.
5. AYA also circulates one
campus-wide email each year asking professors whether they have any
travel plans.
6. Activity ideas that have
worked well: monthly happy hour at a specific bar, "ethnic food
of the month" at different restaurants, pot-luck sing-along, openings
of museum or gallery exhibits, public interest activity followed by
socializing.
7. With younger alumni, always
ask them to bring two or three friends.
Internships
Alison Biel met with local club
representatives to discuss internships. The Summer Community
Service Fellowships are organized through AYA. Alison interviews
candidates and then chooses and assigns them to projects. The
projects must be set up by the local club; $2,800 stipend (which can in
some cases be covered by Yale), 8-week internship with a public service
organization, housing with a club member. Alison also talked
about the "Bulldogs" program, a similar local program for professional
internships.
Admissions
Dean Jeff Brenzel spoke to the
delegates about admissions. He summarized his admissions
philosophy by saying that he wants Yale to be "a disruptive
experience." The alumni interviews are important only in the
final stages of an application, if (for instance) a candidate is in the
balance and needs a push one way or the other. He mentioned that
he enjoys reading the interview reports, because they show him a lot
about how the alumni think about Yale. The percentage of
international students rose steadily over the past 10 years, as a
result of Yale's realization of its role as an international
institution; having international students is important for Yale's
position in the world, as well as for enriching the student body
itself, he said. The rate of admission of international students
is slightly lower than that of U.S. students. Jeff
specifically said that attracting international students is not a high
priority, among other reasons because the caliber of international
applicants is very high. He said that the international
applicants tend to be somewhat self-selecting, and that they are
extremely well-informed about U.S. universities.
One other interesting tidbit; Yale is now the "hot" university, and its
acceptance rates among students who are admitted to Yale and one or
more of Harvard, Stanford and Princeton have all improved. In
response to questions, Jeff said that he discourages interviewers from
trying to compare Yale to the other schools or trying to persuade a
candidate to accept Yale rather than one of the others, because he
feels that the students should make that choice themselves.
Linda Lorimer, Secretary of the
University
Linda addressed the Friday
lunch, and basically talked about how important alumni involvement is
in the University's development. She emphasized the increasing
percentage of women in the alumni group, including in positions of
leadership.
President Levin
Rick Levin gave an interesting
talk which was, essentially, a warm-up of his pitch for the major
capital campaign which is going to be announced later this year.
The University has impressive plans for construction and academic
expansion. From our perspective the interesting thing is that
each student will be expected to spend one term or summer abroad.
