BNOS BATYA

Invitations to the weddings of Bnos Batya girls.

REACHING OUT

42 April 29, 2015

Tickets to Here and Hereafter

“All my life I have worked for Klal Yisrael. This I am doing for myself. This program for Russian girls will be Berish Lander’s ticket to Gan Eden.” As in the case of commemorating a yahrzeit, when the living are mezakeh those who

have passed on through the mitzvos they perform or inspire each year, so too do zechuyos accrue annually to the late Dr. Bernard Lander, z”l, president and founder of Touro College, thanks to the Bnos Batya program in Flatbush that he established nine years ago to ensure the spiritual lives of young women from the Former Soviet Union.

A one-family house on Avenue J just a few steps from the Touro campus is home to approximately 15 girls, ages 17 to 22, who come to study Torah in seminary and complete their college education. Hailing from cities in Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, Lithuania, Germany, and Israel, they spend their mornings at the Bais Yaakov

Academy (BYA) Seminary studying hashkafah, Halachah and standard Torah subjects. The girls have varied academic backgrounds, levels of English profi ciency and knowledge of Torah, but there is an important feature in their lives that unifi es them: They are enveloped in a frum environment all day as they move from seminary back to the dorm for lunch, then on to college for afternoon and evening classes. The opportunity to study without sacrifi cing their commitment to observance is what brings them here.

“Through the generosity of Dr. Lander, later continued by Dr. Alan Kadish in his role as president of Touro College, students from the FSU are given the opportunity at Touro’s Lander College in Flatbush to pursue studies leading to college degrees that will open doors for a dignifi ed parnassah,” stated Robert Goldschmidt, dean of students and vice president at Touro. You must have a proper title for him. Touro provides full-tuition scholarships and facilitates acquisition of student visas, which are required for entry and study in the United States.

BY REBBETZIN FAIGIE HOROWITZ

4310 Iyar 5775

NOW WHAT?It all began ten years ago in Moscow when two young

women who were fi nishing their fi nal year of Jewish high school approached their teachers. They were concerned about Shabbos observance the next year, when they would attend university. The two had been spending Shabbos in the apartment run by Operation Open Curtain, as Shabbos was not observed in their homes. That accommodation was no longer an option, as Russian universities have regular Saturday classes.

Rabbi Eliyahu Meir Klugman of Yerushalayim, who is involved in outreach in the FSU, researched the problem and a possible solution, reasoning that if there were two girls facing the problem, there must be others. Ultimately he joined Harav Shmuel Kamenetsky, shlita, and together they approached Dr. Lander to request scholarships for girls in this situation.

Dr. Lander enthusiastically committed to the infrastructure of the program, including the salary of Mrs. Suri Pinter, director and “mother” of the Bnos Batya program, as well as funding for special classes. Private and group advisement sessions were and are still held by Dr. Avery Horowitz, dean of advisement, and Mrs. Renee Blinder, coordinator of advisement.

The other partners in the pioneer program include Mr. Reuven Dessler and his Operation Open Curtain, as well as BYA Seminary under the leadership of Rabbi Shlomo Teichman, whose committed teachers host the girls regularly for Shabbosos and Yamim Tovim.

During the past the past nine years, about 100 young women have participated in this special program at Touro’s Flatbush campus.

PURPOSE AND PRESSURE“My mother didn’t want me to come even though I had been

thinking about it since sixth grade in Eitz Chaim (a Jewish school in Moscow),” recalls Michal Michaelova. “My next best option was to enroll in the Lauder Midrasha in Berlin. All the girls who were with me there went on to Bnos Batya, but my mother still said no. So I stayed and went to Touro Berlin the next year, but it wasn’t a good place for me.”

Arrangements to enroll in Bnos Batya are not simple. Besides

airfare, which is usually subsidized by the community of origin, a student needs a special visa and must successfully pass the IELTS (International English Language Testing System) exam, which proves that foreign students can benefi t from study in an American college. Michal took care of the entire application procedure by herself and presented her mother with a fait accompli, with a niggling concern about her mother’s reaction.

“But when my mother traveled here to check on me, she had a great time with my second family, [Mr. and Mrs.] Shragi Goldschmidt of Flatbush [son of Dean Goldschmidt] and saw that I was happy and fl ourishing, so she was no longer opposed to my decision.”

There is no better life than living on [Avenue] J,” she continues. “Touro College is Jewish. Everyone understands seminary, being shomer negiah, and observing Halachah. My neshamah is growing here, and I have no reason to go back home except to see my parents.”

Indeed, almost none of the girls permanently go back to where they came from. Most find spouses and settle in the United States, reports Mrs. Pinter. “The overwhelming majority of the girls find shidduchim while they are in the program. We have married couples in Chicago, Los Angeles, Israel, Lakewood and Philadelphia.” Many have entered the allied health fields in various therapies and in

social work. Others are studying finance, multimedia design, and special education.

GERMAN JEWS FOR GERMANYTo return home is the aim of two exceptional students in

the program, however. Two friends who grew up in Osnabruck, Germany, are determined to go back and develop a Bais Yaakov in Germany, which they never had. Growing up in Germany, they could attend only seasonal frum programs in Belgium, Switzerland and Russia.

Even though Malki Grossberg’s parents hail from Uman in the Ukraine, and Rivkie Auerbach’s are from Vilna, Lithuania, the families consider themselves part of the Jewish community in Germany. Like many Jews who feared for their futures when Communism fell, they took advantage of the opportunities tendered by the German government.

REACHING OUT

“THE OVERWHELMING MAJORITY OF THE GIRLS FIND

SHIDDUCHIM WHILE THEY ARE IN THE PROGRAM.

WE HAVE MARRIED COUPLES IN CHICAGO, LOS ANGELES,

ISRAEL, LAKEWOOD AND PHILADELPHIA.”

44 April 29, 2015

The two girls grew up attending German public schools in an environment that sought to deal with its troubled recent past. “We studied the Holocaust in depth for a year, and German identity for three months. The message was that Germany did something bad that cannot be repeated. It can happen anywhere if people do not think,” Malki says.

She feels that the postwar generations are not to be blamed as long as they ensure that the past is not repeated. German people are ashamed of the German role in the attempt to exterminate the Jewish people. “The constant refrain we hear is that German society is not anti-Semitic.” But she avers that there is anti-Semitism beneath the surface, much of it originating in Muslim communities.

“To Germans that I meet, I represent Judaism. I may be the last Jew they will ever encounter. Therefore, I have an obligation to make a kiddush Hashem wherever I go.”

Twenty-fi rst-century living in Germany is on a high standard, Rivkie points out. Health care is excellent, streets are clean, consumer products are of superb quality. Life is very comfortable, even better than in the U.S., she says.

Malki sums up the present state. “We need Rabbis and Jewish infrastructure and Jewish books in Germany. If frum Jews leave Germany, the Nazis win. If we are alive and observe Torah, they lose.”

WHAT IT’S LIKEOver tea and cookies that she served me one arctic January

morning, Adina told about her transformation. “I was a student at Eitz Chaim in Moscow for years and I wasn’t religious. I just didn’t take to it. I started to pay attention in tenth grade, and in eleventh grade I started to keep tznius. When I told my teacher, Devora Mandel, that I wanted to apply to the Bnos Batya program, she was surprised, even though she had been watching me carefully.”

Yaff a put it very simply. “This is the only way for me to stay frum. Had I gone to university back home, I would not have stayed religious. The personal attention we get at Touro and the opportunity to study with other frum girls while pursuing academic study are privileges I could not imagine.”

“The goal is to challenge each Touro student in a way that he or she can meet the challenges,” affi rms Dean Horowitz. “The backgrounds of the Bnos Batya girls give them unique challenges

here at Touro, and therefore we off er them more individual time and advisement.”

“It’s a mixed salad bowl of girls,” says Rivkie Auerbach from Osnabruck. “We learn to get along even though we bring diverse mentalities with us. The Russian mindset is diff erent than the German way of thinking, which is diff erent than the Azerbaijani frame of mind. The cultures are disparate, and we were raised very diff erently. But we become family and help each other out since we don’t have family here.”

That’s the way it is in any seminary. Part of dorm life is learning to get along and learning to be independent. Bnos Batya, however, is more than just a seminary experience. It shepherds the girls through several years of shidduchim, marriage, simchahs and

beyond, providing, advising and mentoring. Some is done by Mrs. Pinter, some is accomplished by community members who befriend the girls, and the girls do a lot for each other.

Mrs. Pinter refl ects on the ten years since she was enlisted to join. “Through my experience in the Former Soviet Union and here in the program, the biggest surprise for me is that Communism did not just destroy Yiddishkeit, but it also negatively aff ected the basic human trust people have in others who want to do good for the sake of doing good. For so long, a dog-eat-dog mentality prevailed in that Marxist culture. In the environment of Bnos Batya, the

girls absorb that chessed for the sake of chessed is a core Jewish value.”

On campus, the girls, dressed appropriately and stylishly, are indistinguishable from their peers. Most babysit and hold local jobs to fi nance their token monthly fee at the dorm, and for pocket money. They take advantage of the amenities of Jewish Brooklyn and nearby communities at Shabbatons arranged by the three dorm counselors. Their command of English is generally good and thus there are no barriers in conversation with the other Touro students.

“This is a tremendous opportunity for me,” concludes Rivkie. “It gives me the chance to be who I want to be. My parents only agreed to my move to New York because of my educational opportunity at Touro.” Multiply that times 15 Bnos Batya girls per year, and you realize how numerous are Dr. Lander’s zechuyos.

Harav Shmuel Kamenetsky, shlita, Rosh Yeshivah of Yeshivah Gedolah of Philadelphia (R), and Rabbi Dr. Bernard Lander, z”l, president of Touro.

4510 Iyar 5775