Dear Friends,

As our 25th reunion approaches, I hope that you will join me in making a contribution to our Class' 25th Reunion Annual Giving Campaign, if you haven't already.  I also want to encourage you to consider supporting the Center for Jewish Life. 

While we were at Princeton, Hillel and Stevenson Hall were the centers of Jewish life at Princeton.   Today, both the kosher kitchen and the campus Hillel are combined at the Center for Jewish Life.  Since my return to campus in 1987, I have been fortunate to be able to watch the establishment of the Center for Jewish Life in a striking building on Washington Road, its growth and the renaissance of the Princeton Jewish community.

For those of you returning to campus for reunions, I encourage you to join me and other members of our class at the Center for Jewish Life building on Washington Road after the P-rade or to join in at the Friday night service during reunions.  This year, the CJL will hold a retrospective roundtable on Jewish life on campus, featuring our classmate Prof. Marianne Sanua'82, Prof. Stan Katz, University Exec. VP Mark Burstein and CJL Exec. Director Rabbi Julie Roth.  The discussion will take place at the CJL on Friday, June 1st at 4:30pm to be followed by Shabbat services and dinner.  For those who are not coming to reunions, I hope you will find another opportunity to return to Princeton and see the CJL.

At reunions, I hope that you will have the chance to meet Rabbi Julie Roth, CJL’s dynamic new executive director.  Under her leadership, CJL is serving the Reform, Conservative and Orthodox communities and providing a wide range of opportunities for Jewish students. Recent examples include “Shabbat 300” (http://www.dailyprincetonian.com/archives/2007/03/05/news/17589.shtml) and the student spring break trip to Spain as part of the “Muslim-Jewish Dialogue at Princeton Program” co-hosted by CJL and the Islamic Chaplaincy. 

When we were students, the local federation provided a significant fraction of the support for Hillel.  Today, this support is gone and the Princeton Jewish community relies on support from its alumni.  As many of the generous alumni from classes from the 1950s age, the responsibility for supporting Jewish life at Princeton is now passing to our generation.

We are establishing a special fund for CJL from the Class of 1982 and hope to establish the tradition of Jewish alumni making contributions to CJL as part of their 25th Reunion, in addition to their support of Annual Giving.  

I hope that you will join me in contributing to this fund.  If you would like to contribute online to the CJL or just see the exciting developments at CJL, please visit (http://www.princetonhillel.org/).   Also, please pass this email along to other Princeton alumni.

I am looking forward to seeing you at Reunions.

Regards,

David Spergel ‘82

Past President, Princeton Hillel

Chair, Department of Astrophysical Sciences

Princeton University