Brandeis First

Dr. Rick Hodes, who has dedicated his life to treating children with life-threatening diseases in Ethiopia, is the 2013 commencement speaker at Brandeis University. Credit: Samantha Reinders

It is my pleasure to announce that Brandeis will welcome Dr. Rick Hodes, who has dedicated his life to treating children with life-threatening diseases in impoverished Ethiopia, as the 2013 commencement speaker at Brandeis University. The medical director of Ethiopia for the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee, he will be among six individuals who will receive honorary degrees at the ceremony.

Hodes has spent more than two decades as a physician treating children in one of the world’s poorest countries. His work has been the subject of a book (Marilyn Berger’s “This is a Soul”) and three documentaries (HBO’s “Making the Crooked Straight,” Sam Shnider’s “Bewoket” and the forthcoming “Zemene.”) He has received numerous awards, including being named a CNN Hero.

Dr. Hodes exemplifies what one person can do to heal the world, by helping thousands of children and working to ensure that many more get life-saving or life-changing medical treatment, he reminds us that social justice is personal and that every child is worth saving.

Our other honorary degree recipients are:

Vartan Gregorian, president of the Carnegie Corporation of New York, one of the nation’s most thoughtful grant-making institutions with a focus on “doing real and permanent good in the world.”

Ellsworth Kelly, the American painter, sculptor and printmaker who has evaded critical attempts to classify him as a Color Field, hard-edge or Minimalist painter.

Chaim Peri, the director emeritus of Yemin Orde Wingate Youth Village, a home and school environment outside Haifa, Israel, that serves at-risk and disadvantaged teenagers from around the world.

Elaine Schuster, public delegate to the United Nations General Assembly and a visionary philanthropist who has championed education, community enrichment and health care, including the pioneering Elaine and Gerald Schuster Institute for Investigative Journalism at Brandeis.

Leon Wieseltier is literary editor of The New Republic and author of several books of fiction and non-fiction.

Please see the Brandeis Now story for more information about each of these distinguished honorees.

Tomorrow night I will, as always when I am not traveling, be on campus for Friday night at one of our many student-led services. When I do so, I know that I will be remembering last Shabbat in Delhi during my trip to India.

Last Friday night, we attended services at Judah Hyam, a Sephardi congregation in central New Delhi that was founded in the mid-19th century, and were welcomed warmly. But Ezekiel Malekar, the leader of the congregation, told his visitors — from the United States, Europe and Israel — frankly, that if not for tourists and expats, Judah Hyam’s light would go out.  As it is, a minyan is present only on Friday evening.

So, next morning, we set out in search of the only show in town — Chabad of New Delhi — at an address the concierge in our hotel could not pinpoint on either maps or computer. “Ask the rickshaw drivers,” he advised.

Our guide was also perplexed, but rose to the challenge. Accosting one driver, policeman and shop keeper after another, he helped us close in on a location in Pahat Ganj, a lively neighborhood where backpackers and students who in an earlier day would have been called hippies mixed with a crush of Indians flowing through a pedestrians-only bazaar.

We knew we were close when we spotted Avi’s silk shop and Farouk’s leather goods, both displaying their names in Hebrew and English characters.

Yet we would have followed our guide right past our goal had not Rabbi Shmuel Sharf, wearing his tallit and a long black robe, not come out in the street seeking to complete the Chabad minyan just as we were going by.

“We’ve been looking for you,” my companion and I said to him in one breath; in the same instant he said, “I’ve been looking for you.”

Through a warren of shops, up a narrow stair past a pile of backpacks and there we were — numbers nine and 10. “We’ve been waiting for you,” said one of the eight men there.  Two or three others came in as the service was in progress, and several young men passed through from what seemed to be a hostel on the third floor. Our small group comprised young and old, and people from at least three continents — for that morning, a community.

President Lawrence with Ramji, left, and Benu Bharaney, P'15, who hosted a reception in New Delhi for families with current or potential future students at Brandeis.

NEW DELHI – It has become almost a cliché to say that India is a nation of juxtapositions. But again and again I am struck by the dramatic contrasts here. Several examples make the point:

• We have met with and been hosted by parents of Brandeis students and alumni who have been extraordinary in their hospitality, warmth and generosity. Yet as one foreign diplomat reminded me, “Each morning, before they can focus fully on other things, India’s leaders must figure out how to feed 1.2 billion people.”
• I had the privilege some years ago to visit the temple city of Tirupati, the home of one of Hinduism’s holiest and most-visited sites. Up to 100,000 pilgrims visit the mountaintop shrine daily, many waiting in line for hours (or even days) to honor beliefs and traditions hallowed for many centuries. Yet I learned this week that Tirupati now draws most of the energy to prepare food for this mass of pilgrims from sophisticated solar technology.
• Business is booming, and incomes are rising — at least for the educated. India possesses many of the assets of a fully modern nation, like excellent telecommunications, top-flight research facilities, superhighways and subways. But impoverished villages with poor roads, worse sewage and no clean water are always just around the corner from the 21st century. Something like 300 million people (roughly the population of the United States) live on less than a dollar a day. Yet something like 300 million people inhabit what can be described as a rising middle class.

A last example is most relevant to our current mission: Illiteracy is a serious problem here, yet India boasts some of the world’s great universities. Some of the schools are enormous – some 600,000 students at Mumbai University, 200,000 at Delhi University. But the need is much greater than the capacity of the education system. Only about one percent of applicants to top-flight universities are admitted. At every level, there simply are not enough seats.

Brandeis can’t fix all this, any more than direct donations from the wealthy would get all the cruelly suffering beggar children and amputees off the sidewalks. To be involved with India is to try to grasp both the strong and vital India and the discouragingly needy one.

Engagement is as much about “us” as it is about “them.” We must prepare our students to live and work in a world that is being changed in fundamental ways by emergent economies like India, Brazil and China and at the same time must maintain and strengthen our core commitment to social justice.

What we have to figure out is what we can do most effectively to provide opportunities for our students who work, study and volunteer here, to work with Indians striving to make their country and our world a better place, and to welcome the growing number of high-quality Indian students who are interested in a Brandeis education.

It has been inspiring to meet so many parents, friends and prospective students who get the Brandeis mission and are eager to lend their support and their energy. They are attracted to the promise of the liberal arts approach, and want to opt out of a system rigidly focused on careers from the very beginning of the college experience.

William Lodge '13, left, and Sophie Golomb '13, right, who are currently studying in India, with Professor Harleen Singh, faculty chair of the Brandeis-India Initiative.

Atul Punj, father of Shiv Punj ’13, Ramji and Benu Bharaney, parents of Umedh Bharaney ’15, and Ashim and Sonal Saraf, parents of Arnav Saraf ’15, all welcomed us into their homes and invited friends and interested students to talk about Brandeis.

Ramji Bharaney gave us a particularly powerful endorsement.

“I’m glad he got in,” Ramji said of his son. “He loves it. I love it. I can see the change in him, the sense of responsibility, the maturity.”

We want the best students in the world to come to Brandeis. Many are here, and families like the Bharaneys are encouraging them.

Identifying where exactly to direct our social justice efforts, and how to offer the best possible study and internship experiences here, comprise the harder work of our current mission. We are discussing specifics, both with social justice and service organizations and with universities and research institutions. There is a range of important possibilities on the table for faculty and student collaborations, placement of volunteers and other engagements.