(Chabad.edu) A survey of campus Chabad House activities conducted by the New York-based Chabad on Campus International Foundation concluded that some 35,750 individual students took part in holiday activities during the Hebrew month of Tishrei, whether it was attending a Rosh Hashanah dinner, hearing the shofar, going to Kol Nidre services, dancing during Simchat Torah or any one of several other offerings.
All told, the survey found, Chabad-Lubavitch emissaries serving more than 100 colleges in the United States, as well as in Canada, Europe and Israel, spent close to $1 million on Tishrei events.
The Chabad on Campus International Foundation coordinates a network of independently-operated campus-based Chabad Houses.
According to interim results of the Web-based questionnaire, a total of 17,050 students attended Rosh Hashanah meals and just shy of 13,000 heard the shofar the first day of the holiday, including more than 4,500 whom Chabad representatives visited throughout the day for the express purpose of blowing the shofar. More than 6,000 attended Yom Kippur services and the traditional break-fast afterwards, an impressive number considering that many students went home for the holiday, which fell out on a Saturday this year.
More than 10,000 students ate in a Chabad sukkah – a temporary dwelling covered by a roof designed to leak in the case of rain – on the first days of Sukkot and more than 9,000 attended a Chabad House Simchat Torah celebration.
Together, Chabad Houses served more than 61,450 meals during holiday celebrations.
"What we see in this survey is a reflection of students' tremendous dedication to some of the more exotic aspects of their faith," said Rabbi Yossy Gordon, executive director of Chabad on Campus. "The High Holiday of Rosh Hashanah has always been one of the most popular days on the Jewish calendar, but this survey demonstrates that Sukkot meals and Simchat Torah feasts drew almost as many students."
Rabbi Berl Goldman, co-director of the Lubavitch Jewish Center at the University of Florida, said that the receptiveness of students is inspiring.
"Jewish students," he said, "many of whom by and large have had no formal Jewish education, are quite impressively receptive to learn how meaningful, how exciting their religion is."
Added Gordon: "While the numbers are impressive, we won't rest until every Jew is afforded an opportunity to experience their heritage."
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