Rabbi Steven Weil, Senior Rabbi, Beth Jacob Congregation in Beverly Hills, and starting April 1, the Orthodox Union’s Executive Vice President, made a visit to the Heshe and Harriet Seif Jewish Learning Initiative on Campus (JLIC) program at UCLA.
JLIC is one of the OU’s major programs; it sends a rabbinic couple to 15 college campuses across North America and Canada to enable, encourage, and advance the Torah education and committment of Orthodox students at secular universities.
Rabbi Weil spoke at the weekly Parsha and Pizza program, which is visited by mnay local OU rabbis who give a lecture on the weekly Torah portion to a group of 20-30 UCLA students who meet for dinner and learning every Thursday night at Hillel.
Rabbi Aryeh and Sharona Kaplan, the Torah Educators at UCLA, stated, “Rabbi Weil’s relationship with JLIC at UCLA has always been very strong. He has taught students at the Hillel on several occasions; was the featured speaker introducing the video of Rav Soloveitchik; and even hosted 60-70 JLIC students in his home for an oneg during a JLIC shabbaton last year. We are thrilled students had a chance to meet and learn from Rabbi Weil. He is a model of so much of what we are trying to transmit to the students. It’s invaluable for them to have direct exposure to such an eloquent, charismatic personality who is clearly well-educated, well-versed in Torah, and is so well-received.”