by Robert Wiener
NJJN Staff Writer

January 10, 2008

As Drew University officials review a travel policy that currently prohibits study abroad in Israel, the Livingston sophomore who triggered its revaluation is heading for a semester in Tel Aviv.

Rather than wait for a Drew committee to finish its review of the travel policy, Jeremy Dery took a leave of absence from the Madison university.

On Jan. 12, he will leave for a six-month stay in Israel, where he will study at Tel Aviv University.

“I didn’t go through the official channel,” he told NJ Jewish News.

Last October, Drew officials informed Dery that he would not receive credit for courses he wished to take at TAU. They said Drew’s insurance policy does not cover study in Israel, which is on a State Department list of places about which there are travel warnings.

Dery enlisted the media and Jewish officials in protesting the decision. In response, Drew officials formed a student-faculty-administration committee to review its policy.

A Drew spokesman said that “it is possible” that a new policy could be in place by the end of March.

“There has been no change from our end. I wouldn’t fix a date” by which the policy would be amended, said David Muha, the university’s chief communications officer.

In the meantime, Dery applied for a leave and arranged with Drew’s financial office to transfer his federal and personal loans to Tel Aviv University.

The funds will cover his $5,000 tuition and another several thousand dollars for living expenses. The semester at TAU will be less costly than the $40,000 he is paying in annual tuition at Drew.

Dery will also receive a $2,000 stipend from MASA, a Jerusalem-based organization supported by Jewish federations that makes grants in aid to foreign students in Israel.

He will also receive a $250 stipend from United Jewish Communities of MetroWest NJ, which has asked Drew officials to reverse its travel ban.

“I am delighted that he is going,” said Max Kleinman, executive vice president of UJC MetroWest NJ. “We think he is engaged in a courageous act and is to be praised for exerting some leadership in an area where other people his age would have stood on the sideline or retreated. We will provide him with support — morally, financially, and otherwise. We hope that he will be an example to help other college students who are studying in Israel.”

For his first month at TAU, Dery will begin a crash course in Hebrew at an ulpan, an intensive language learning center. When the semester starts in mid-February, he will study Middle Eastern politics and Jewish history.

All the while, he will be watching what happens at Drew, hoping the committee will change its travel policy.

“If there is a new policy in place, they will send over a new waiver form. I’ll sign it in Israel, and then my credits will be accepted. But that we won’t know until March,” Dery said.

Muha emphasized that the committee’s work is focused on the policy in general, not on Dery’s situation.

“I don’t want to speculate what will happen when the committee concludes its work as it relates to Jeremy’s travels,” said Muha. “We will take one thing at a time.”

When he returns to New Jersey in June, Dery will have an internship at the Israeli consulate in New York City, which is encouraging him to write a Web log on his daily life in Israel.

“They want to use it as a promotional tool to recruit foreign students for Israeli universities,” he said.

‘Very supportive’

Students at other colleges in the state regularly study in Israel with little or no opposition from administrators.

Julie Tsimring of Marlboro Township is beginning a semester of study at Hebrew University in Jerusalem halfway through her junior year at Montclair State University.

“At first, there were some problems with the State Department travel advisory,” she said. “But when I made it clear I was set on going there, whether there was a travel advisory or not, Montclair was very supportive and did anything they could to make it happen.”

Tsimring is majoring in community health and minoring in Jewish studies.

“I had to go study in Israel; I couldn’t pass it up,” she said. “I am hoping to become fluent in Hebrew and take some other courses related to Jewish studies.”

She is contemplating whether to stay on in Jerusalem to do a summer internship in a health-related field.

“Montclair is working very well with me,” she said. “My professors know I’m very interested in integrating my major and my minor. They are very helpful.”

She shrugs off the State Department’s warning about travel to Israel.

“As a health major, we learn that you have such a great risk of getting into a car accident. The dangers you face in Israel are so different from the ones we face here they seem very alarming to us, but I really think it is just a matter of choosing what sort of danger. I don’t look at danger as something that can stop me from going somewhere or doing something.”