YIVO Offers Full Summer Program for Online and In Person Students

This coming Friday, July 29, 2022, 76 students will graduate from The Uriel Weinreich Summer Program in Yiddish Language, Literature, and Culture, the world’s longest-running Yiddish summer program.

For the first time in YIVO's history, this year's program features a unique structure to meet students where they are – two programs running concurrently, one online and one in-person.

In 2020, in response to the pandemic, the program moved online for the first time and saw some of its largest enrollments in its over 50-year history. This year, the program is using the lessons learned from running online for the last two years, as well as its previous years running in person, to create a streamlined, engaging program for its students.

Whether attending in person or online, students receive a full selection of classes. Unlike most other programs, classes are not hybrid. Students attending online have their own dedicated classes taking place on Zoom, rather than signing in to watch the classes taking place on site. This allows for more engaging, impactful classes with more focused attention from the teachers. Canvas, a learning management system, was one of the tools adopted when the program first moved online. Now it is being used by both online and in person students to allow easier access to class materials. Two teaching assistants run in-person and online study halls, allowing students time to socialize with each other and receive help as needed.

“This year’s program is our latest innovation in teaching Yiddish,” said Ben Kaplan, YIVO’s Director of Education. “Students have different learning needs for their summer study, and the flexibility of this year’s dual format ensures our program is accessible regardless of where students find themselves in life or in the world.”

This summer’s program brought together students (from 16 to 81 years old) and nearly two dozen instructors from 23 states and 11 countries – Australia, Canada, Croatia, Germany, France, Great Britain, Georgia, Portugal, Sweden, Ukraine, and United States. Students will have completed six weeks of intensive study of Yiddish language, literature, and culture, including over 180 course hours, and are eligible to receive college credit through Bard College.

This year’s Summer Program offerings included seminars on Yiddish theater, literature, and culture and electives on Yiddish song, baking and cooking, archival research, and Jewish theology. The program also included The Yiddish Civilization Lecture Series, a nine-lecture series covering broad topics from Yiddish theater, poetry, and music to gender roles, exile, and the development of the Yiddish language.

To help students connect outside the classroom and practice their conversational Yiddish, YIVO also hosted groups called krayzlekh (“circles” or “social groups” in Yiddish). These are Zoom meetings around personal and professional interests such as music, literature & translation, Jewish history, queer theory and gender studies, art, theater & film, and more. It is also one of several opportunities for the online and in-person students to get to know one another.

On Friday nights, the Summer Program hosts a shabes-farbrengen, a celebratory online gathering where students can meet and chat with a special guest from the world of Yiddish arts and culture. Guests this year included poet Irena Klepfisz, actor and director Eleanor Reissa, singer-songwriter Daniel Kahn, and the comedy duo Eli Batalion and Jamie Elman, creators of the Yiddish-language web series Yidlife Crisis.

Established in 1968, the Summer Program has become a symbol of Yiddish cultural resilience and continuity. The first and longest-running program of its kind, YIVO’s Summer Program has trained generations of scholars, teachers, and students to embrace the richness, complexity, and beauty of the Yiddish language and Yiddish culture. Alumni from the Summer Program have gone on to careers as leading academics and scholars, world-renowned musicians and artists, archivists, librarians, teachers, and individuals from all professions and walks of life who draw inspiration from Yiddish culture.

YIVO has seen unprecedented growth in demand for its Yiddish classes since the beginning of the pandemic. This past year saw the largest spring season of Yiddish language and culture classes ever with nearly 450 students in 42 classes. This coming fall, YIVO will offer over 40 classes in Yiddish, literature, history, and more.

For any media inquiries please contact:
Ben Kaplan
Director of Education

YIVO

The YIVO Institute for Jewish Research is dedicated to the preservation and study of the history and culture of East European Jewry worldwide. For nearly a century, YIVO has pioneered new forms of Jewish scholarship, research, education, and cultural expression. Our public programs and exhibitions, as well as online and on-site courses, extend our outreach to a global community. The YIVO Archives contains 24 million unique items and YIVO’s Library has over 400,000 volumes—the single largest resource for the study of East European Jewish life in the world. yivo.org / yivo.org/the-whole-story