January 24, 2008
A local Orthodox rabbi has joined colleagues in warning about the high risk behaviors of some students who spend the so-called yeshiva week vacation in Florida.
The issue came to wide public attention last year after an opinion article in The New York Jewish Week described day-school kids indulging in drugs, alcohol, and sexual activity during their Miami vacation.
In advance of yeshiva week, Rabbi Eliezer Zwickler of Ahawas Achim B’nai Jacob and David in West Orange sent an e-mail to synagogue families urging them not to send their children to Florida unsupervised.
“In past years, there has been activity which has been unbecoming of Orthodox Jews, involving abuse of alcohol, drug use, and promiscuous behavior. At times, there have been very tragic results,” wrote Zwickler. “We are obligated as parents to educate our children and keep them safe even if they feel that our actions are not in their best interests. This is a matter of life and death on many levels.”
In an interview with NJ Jewish News, Zwickler said it is up to parents to set limits.
“I don’t want to sound negative,” Zwickler said. He said that the kids should enjoy “their hard-earned vacation.” But he worries. “The bottom line is that parents have to be vigilant. As much as kids want their space and want their parents to stay out, they are still kids and we have to do parenting,” he said.
He recalled a parent he encountered years ago from a different community who told him she didn’t worry about her son because the boy had a cell phone and she could call and check on him and find out where he was.
“Let’s not be naive,” he said, suggesting some skepticism and a reality check for parents.
One parent of yeshiva students, Lee Rosenblum, said he too has heard stories of inappropriate behavior during yeshiva week.
Rosenblum has children ages 14 and 16 at Bruriah High School for Girls in Elizabeth and children ages 12 and 17 at the Kushner academy and high school in Livingston, as well as a six-year-old who attends the Jewish Education Center in Elizabeth.
He told NJJN in an e-mail that one of his children said he has friends who have participated in the Miami yeshiva week scene but “haven’t gotten caught.” Rosenblum said he would not send his own children to Florida alone. He also suggested that there is a delicate balance to be struck between freedom and limits. “At ages 16 and 17, teenagers should be given some freedom,” he said, “but going out of state alone and unsupervised for an extended period of time (a week) is just not worth the risk. (As we have all seen and heard, teenagers can find trouble given enough freedom).”
The Orthodox Union has been encouraging Orthodox youth to consider alternatives to winter and spring breaks in traditional vacation spots. At Negiah.org, an OU-sponsored Web site promoting abstinence among teens, an entry warns about the risks of alcohol abuse and sexual activity. “Instead of risking your health with a trip ‘gone wild,’ why not look into a more wholesome, uplifting Spring Break activity?” says the Web posting. “Take a trip to Israel or help build houses for the homeless, for example. That’s a Spring Break you’re not likely to regret.”
Rabbi Dr. Avraham Twerski, an expert on drug and alcohol abuse, lectures students and parents on the risks of winter break, as he did earlier this month at an Orthodox synagogue in Flatbush, Brooklyn.
Other Jewish groups have also been promoting “alternative winter breaks” to encourage social action, educational, and tzedaka projects. The National Council of Synagogue Youth, the Orthodox Union youth group, hosts various programs during winter break, including a national Yarchei Kallah, or week of Jewish learning, held in Stamford, Conn. The OU and Touro College are running a family mission to Israel Jan. 20-27, on which parents and their high school seniors can visit yeshivot and seminaries in Israel.
Zwickler suggested that parents vacation together with their children. When children have the opportunity to be with their friends, “that’s wonderful,” he said. “We still need to make sure they’re in a safe environment where they are not susceptible to falling into tragic and difficult circumstances. The concept of yeshiva week should not be spring break, where kids go to Florida to party. If it were, it would call into question the whole concept of yeshiva week.”
The Jewish Week article set off a round of soul-searching among Orthodox Jews who maintain Web logs, or blogs.
“Hey, I’m all for giving kids a little freedom — God knows that they need some, considering the constraints of attending 6 days a week of Yeshiva,” wrote the popular blogger “Orthomom.” “But never without proper supervision, never without proper attendance to their safety. Is it easy to strike the right balance? Of course not. But getting it wrong can have dire circumstances.”