This fall, Jewish students should look for more than a place to belong

When Jewish students arrive on campus this fall, they will receive maps, schedules, passwords, meal plans and plenty of advice about how to succeed. They will be told to meet professors, join clubs and keep an open mind. All of that matters.

But Jewish freshmen need one additional piece of advice: Find your community early, and help make it visible, confident and grounded in Jewish values.

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The first weeks of college can be disorienting. Students are building new routines and asking whom they can trust, where they belong and what parts of themselves they will carry into adulthood. Some Jewish students arrive from deeply connected homes; others are just beginning to explore what being Jewish means. Campus life should have room for all of them.

Freshmen should seek a community that is meaningful to them. They should look for people who are warm without being shallow, proud without being offensive and serious about making Jewish life part of campus life. That community may be found at Hillel, Chabad, a place of worship or a Shabbat table shared with friends. For Jewish men, it may also be found in Alpha Epsilon Pi, where a fraternity house can become something deeper: a Jewish home away from home, built around brotherhood, shared responsibility and the confidence to live openly as a Jew, no matter how one defines that.

Finding a meaningful place on campus, however, rarely happens without effort. Each student must take the initiative to show up, introduce themselves, explore different opportunities, and seek out the people and spaces that feel real.

Taking initiative. College brings intellectual challenges and moral debate and, with that, some amount of self-questioning, perhaps for the first time. Students need places where they can ask difficult questions, learn about Jewish history and tradition, and find friends who will celebrate with them and remind them that Jewish identity is not a burden to carry alone.

That is part of what AEPi can offer. Beyond social events, it can provide older students who remember what it was like to be new, peers who notice when someone is struggling, and a setting where Jewish holidays and concerns don’t require an explanation. When students feel isolated or uneasy, knowing there is a place for them—and brothers ready to stand with them—can make campus feel safer and more like home. It can be a place where Jewish students feel secure enough to let their Jewish pride shine.

The responsibility, however, does not belong to freshmen alone. Returning students, faculty, alumni and campus Jewish professionals must recognize that welcome is an active practice. It is not enough to advertise an event and hope newcomers appear. Upperclassmen should invite freshmen to meals, make introductions, explain unfamiliar customs and make clear that there is no test of Jewish authenticity at the door.

Visibility matters. Jewish pride is not arrogance, nor should it be confused with hostility toward anyone else. It is the affirmation that Jewish life belongs on campus. It can look like wearing a Star of David, building a sukkah, hosting a learning program, singing Hebrew songs or speaking openly about family traditions. It may be a Shabbat dinner, a public service project or a group of friends refusing to hide who they are. Jewish pride grows when it is practiced together.

Jewish students should not have to choose between being accepted and being recognizable. Their communities should help them confront antisemitism and correct misinformation. But pride should never become a wall around Jewish life. Its purpose is not simply to make Jews more visible; it is to make Jewish values more visible as well.

Social justice. Tikkun olam is the obligation to help repair a broken world. On campus, that principle needs to move from slogan to action. Jewish organizations can lead food drives, tutor local children, support refugees, participate in environmental projects and advocate for students facing discrimination. AEPi chapters regularly turn collective identity into collective service, showing that Jewish pride is not merely inherited but lived through responsibility.

Service can also become a bridge into belonging. A freshman who feels uncertain about prayer or theology may still understand the call to help. He or she may first attend because of a volunteer project, stay for dinner, return for an event and eventually become the person who welcomes the next new student. That is how a community renews itself—not by demanding that students arrive fully formed, but by giving them meaningful ways to grow.

On campuses where conversations about religion, identity, politics and Israel can become heated, Jewish students should neither disappear nor surrender their complexity. At the same time, that demands listening as well as speaking. It means resisting dehumanizing language, seeking honest dialogue and building coalitions without erasing real differences. Jewish tradition has always contained argument; the goal is not to eliminate disagreement but to elevate it.

Freshmen should look for leaders who model that balance. The best Jewish communities will defend their members without teaching them to fear everyone outside the group. They will encourage pride without cultivating isolation. They will confront antisemitism and anti-Zionism while also standing against racism and every form of hatred.

College is a place where young people decide not only what they believe, but how they will live. Jewish students should return ready to belong, stand tall and repair what they can. Their campuses—and the wider community—will be better for it.

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