When I thought about this a bit more, I realized that many of us also take our parents for granted despite the fact that they do so much for us in every area. When it comes to the maintenance crew, however, we don\u2019t even notice them. We don’t just take them for granted; for many people, they are simply invisible. Beyond noticing the incredible job they do, I wanted all the students to have an awareness of how we could be helping them. Instead of leaving coffee cups all over the Beit Medrash for others to clean up, we could be aware that each of us can throw out our one cup and the overall effect would make life so much easier for the crew. I was once in a Beit Medrash and saw 100 coffee cups on the tables and I wondered who the talmidim<\/em> thought would clean up their mess. When each person takes responsibility for his own cup, we ease the burden and make a Kiddush Hashem<\/em> in the process.<\/p>\n The difference in honoring someone at a shul<\/em> dinner vs. our maintenance crew breakfast is that a shul<\/em> dinner has a one-time honoree who will be replaced next year by a new person. The people we chose to honor at our breakfast are not one-time honorees. They are people whose work on our behalf is ongoing, and taking the time to recognize this shifts our attitude and promotes hakarat hatov<\/em>.\u00a0 Jews are called “Yehudim”\u2013those who are \u201cmodeh\u201d or acknowledge\u2013and hakarat hatov<\/em> is a basic, essential part of who we are. I wanted to put that into practice and heighten our awareness of the need to recognize the crew who cleans the hallway while we are learning, tidies up the Beit Medrash while we are in the lab\u2026all the time, not just this one day. I wanted to put them on the radar screen of all the students and so I started promoting the event.<\/p>\n When I put up signs about this breakfast, a lot of students were confused. Usually, when there\u2019s a sponsored breakfast, it means we are hosting a big-name speaker or a rosh yeshiva<\/em>. They couldn\u2019t figure out what we were trying to do.<\/p>\n I think it\u2019s important for Jews to interact in a positive way with the non-Jews we come in contact with daily wherever we find ourselves. Always acting like a mentsch<\/em> and showing an interest in others as people is critical. I think that not only was planning this event worthwhile,\u00a0every person in the school took a positive lesson from the event. In some ways, it was more important and inspiring than a mussar shmuess<\/em>. Everyone contributed something\u2013set up, served or cleaned up\u2013and when they saw the reaction of the crew, they all realized how important this effort was.<\/p>\n I am\u00a0looking forward to the second annual Maintenance\u00a0Appreciation\u00a0Breakfast. I also sincerely hope others will follow our lead.<\/p>\n Azzi Kimmel is Student Government President at Touro\u2019s Lander College for Men. He is a psychology major and is planning for a career in Clinical Psychology <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The maintenance crew at Touro\u2019s Lander College\u00a0for Men works so hard every day. Whatever needs to get done, whether\u00a0painting\u00a0the walls in the student government office or cleaning the bathrooms at least three times a day, the crew does it with a smile. I felt it was so important to recognize them publicly with a special<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":133749,"featured_media":61669,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_cloudinary_featured_overwrite":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[85],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-61668","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-inspiration"],"yoast_head":"\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.ou.org\/life\/files\/maintenance-breakfast-1-300x175.jpg\")
The morning of the breakfast, the Student Government woke up early and davened<\/em> at an early minyan<\/em>. We told the crew that they weren’t allowed to do any work and the student government set up the entire breakfast, served the food\u00a0and cleaned everything up. People responded much more enthusiastically than expected. At the event, we had maintenance staff sitting up on the dais\u00a0instead of the mashgiach<\/em>, the rosh yeshiva<\/em> and the rebbeim<\/em>. There was cheering, clapping and a standing ovation for the maintenance crew. Every crew member was called up by name, they each received a box of chocolate, a gift card and a personal thank-you letter. Each one of them had a huge smile on his face that day. They started talking to all of us more often and the effects of that event are still felt months later. Everyone now notices the cleaning crew, thanks them regularly and talks to them in a friendly manner.<\/p>\n
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