Sheri Sager Scholarship in Jewish Studies

Thanks to a generous gift from community member Sheri Sager, the Jewish Studies Program is able to award scholarships each semester to outstanding Jewish Studies students completing the minor program.

Please download and submit the Sager Scholarship form, along with an essay about the importance of Jewish Studies to you. The Fall 2007 deadline for submission is November 1st; awards will be announced by November 15th.

Fall 2008 Sherri Sager Scholarship winner:

Yael Kafri ('09), for her beautiful essay about how vital Jewish Studies is to her life, her art, her teaching. She speaks of how her art work of Israel embodies both her passions and her learning ( she is completing a double major in Art Studio and Middle East Studies, as well as a Jewish Studies minor).

".... My painting of an "Early Settlement Guard" was motivated by studying about Judaism and the Middle East. Shortly after the 2006 summer war between Israel and Lebanon, I came across a photo of a man and woman "Palmach" fighters in 1930s Israel, wearing military clothing and carrying weapons. The woman in the picture had a tremendous effect on me. First I was impressed by how women were equally included in the defense of the country even at that time in history. Also I could not ignore the irony of someone as pretty as she, who could have been a silver screen movie star, dressed in military clothing, defending what she believed in. I painted her with a tower and stockade in the background to symbolize the overnight forming of settlements in the Negev Desert. This paiting was praised the most at my show, and I was happy to be able to explain to people more about this time period in Jewish history."