December 9, 2009
Laurence Bolotin, Executive Director of ZBT at ICC Fall Consultation.
Although only three Greek-letter organizations are currently represented on the membership rolls of the Israel on Campus Coalition, six organizations came together at the December 3 ICC Fall Consultation to discuss the progress of the Greek Outreach Initiative and to chart the next priorities and steps to take in the ICC’s Greek engagement plan. Along with representatives from Alpha Epsilon Pi, Alpha Epsilon Phi and Zeta Beta Tau, the newly formed Greek Outreach Task Force was rounded out by contributors from the American-Israeli Cooperative Enterprise (AICE), the Jewish National Fund (JNF) and the Charles and Lynn Schusterman Family Foundation (CLSFF).
A major goal laid out by the task force was to expand upon the existing Israel travel opportunities for Greek students and create new programs to draw fraternity and sorority members to study abroad and visit Israel. To increase the number of available seats for Greeks on the Taglit-Birthright Israel programs, new partnerships will be developed with trip providers in addition to Hillel, with the goal of obtaining as many as 120 slots for students to visit Israel with other Greek students.
In advance of the upcoming semester, a joint ICC-IUC survey has been distributed to all American students spending their spring 2010 term in Israel to approximate the number of Greek students abroad in Israel. Data gleaned from this survey will enable more targeted recruitment of fraternity and sorority members from U.S. campuses, in addition to providing information about the Greek-centric programs that could be offered to those students during their time studying in Israel.
On the domestic agenda, it is the aim of the task force to work with each of the 5 historically Jewish fraternities and sororities to research and formally adopt an Israeli philanthropy as part of their slate of charitable beneficiaries. This act will not only help to demonstrate the important connection that each of these organizations has to Israel, but also direct dollars raised through campus charitable events to Israeli institutions in need.
Realizing that many fraternities and sororities are located in their own chapter houses on campus, these venues provide excellent space to host speakers, presentations and Israel events during the semester. Since the speakers on tour with ICC member organizations generally appear at multiple campus events during the same visit, a casual talk during dinner hosted in a fraternity or sorority house would be the perfect growth of existing programs to new locations and audiences. The Greek Outreach Task Force specifically called for the establishment of a database of both chapter locations and ICC-related speaker tours to be available and consulted in tandem when planning the details of specific campus visits.
The Greek Outreach Task Force will reconvene monthly over the winter recess and spring semester to review these and other goals, with the intention of achieving measurable progress towards them by summer 2010. With the valued input of all interested ICC members, we look forward to breaking new ground and improving on the accomplishments of the Greek Outreach Initiative to date.