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Already over a year ago, when the pandemic was reaching full force and words like “quarantine” and “isolation” were popularizing in our vocabulary, there were questions about the compatibility of social restrictions with summer camp programming. Could there be an NCSY Kollel with masks, capsules, and distance?
One of the concerns related to the interpersonal dynamic. Beyond learning, trips, and sports, the summer experience often distills into a social workshop. Is there camp without face-to-face time (as opposed to Facetime) and with smiles that remain covered?
But there was an additional question, less obvious than the first. Summer and camp have always been associated with wide open spaces. With road trips and bus rides. Can lockdown and NCSY Kollel coexist?
Now, almost two weeks into our 2021 NCSY adventure, we are delighting in a return to most normalcy and a summer with few restrictions. There is a special appreciation for the simple pleasures of congregating and laughing together, and just being a restored community. At the same time, there is also a renewed sense of awe and wonder at a world that is vast and filled with opportunity. Imaginations are unrestrained, possibilities seem endless. This is in the best spirit and representation of youth and summer. Of NCSY Kollel.
There is something about being spread out that can enhance even more mundane experiences. While greater concentration creates sharper focus, a wide dispersal can provide greater variety and maximum impact.
This is one of the ways in which we are energized by our campus(es). First, the ever-expanding NCSY Kollel universe promotes and evokes creative thoughts and big dreams. We are, with our families, over 500 souls this summer. We are on 2 campuses, occupying over 100 dorm rooms, 2 batei medrash (study halls), 2 dining rooms, 7 basketball courts, 2 hockey courts, and a soccer field. We are not cramped or crowded. We simply have a larger footprint than ever before.
On both campuses, there is a feature that further highlights this effect. Kollel North and Kollel South are blessed with breathtaking views that span impossibly wide swaths of beautiful Israel. There is nothing ever claustrophobic or limited about the Beit Meir environment. On our first night, we gathered at one of the most spectacular vantage points (in the very center of the South Campus). We spoke of empty spaces and unwritten chapters. These images and thoughts are constant companions through the NCSY Kollel day. We are a far cry from 4 walls and a zoom account.
And if these views offer a kind of visual map of the Holy Land, then Tuesday’s tiyul began to walk those borders and contours. Appropriate to the names, the North campus ventured to the waterfalls, greenery, and rivers of the far North, while our South campus travelled to the deepest seas and rocky desert mountains of southernmost Israel. Each trip was outstanding in its own right- waterparks, snorkeling, Masada, rafting, daredevil hikes, and more. But beyond all, there was a cumulative effect of being from top to bottom, east to west, and almost everywhere in between. It is exhilarating to be part of a program with such reach and such limitless potential. 
It’s also a major benefit of our extensive mini tiyul program as well as our shiur trip rotations. Busses are coming and going from NCSY Kollel all day. Each shiur will have between 2 and 6 educational trips a summer. These outings are full tiyul days themselves on many other programs. There are tours of the old city, hands-on Israel advocacy, visits to the Aish HaTorah World Center, and high-level chessed projects. Every afternoon we offer alternatives to sports leagues in the form of great trips that stimulate and energize. This week alone, our mini tiyuls hit the Bar Kochba Caves, The Biblical Museum of Natural History, Castel Historical Tour, and “Thursday Shabbos Prep in Meah Shearim.” These trips are drawing significantly higher numbers than ever before, even beyond our overall proportional growth. Getting out so often means broadening horizons. We are never stuck, we are always moving.
This also explains some of the incomparable energy and passion that emerges from our ball fields and courts. In general, some have applied a quote from Fitzgerald’s Gatsby to explain our fascination with sports: “…face to face for the last time in history with something commensurate to his capacity for wonder.” On Thursday our sports week culminated in the awesome spectacle of 24 consecutive games between our two campuses and two league divisions. With unlimited Hatch Chicken Wings on the line, there were thrilling contests all afternoon. There were star performances, buzzer beater shots, super teams, and an enthusiastic crowd with strong rooting interests across the entire moshav. It was big. And wondrous. Just like NCSY Kollel is meant to be.
In the coming weeks, we will delve more into the various facets of our learning program. In the meantime, we can conclude this summary with one point that is entirely consistent with the vastness we’ve described before. We often refer to our Torah leaders as “Gedolim (great ones)”. It has been suggested that the greatness is a reference to more than stature, brainpower, or accumulated knowledge. Instead, it connotes broad thinking, all-encompassing perspectives, and diversity of experience and approach. When our NCSYers meet and learn with Rav Schachter, Rav Sobolofsky, and Rav Twersky, they are awed by exactly this kind of personality. They are inspired by wisdom that is vast and scholarship that accepts few boundaries.
This week we also welcomed Rav Dov Zinger to our program for two days of high-level interactions with our staff and some NCSYers. Rav Zinger is a remarkable Torah leader who is regarded as one of the preeminent teachers in Israel today. It is hard to decide which of his meetings were more impressive. He spoke with our Roshei Yeshiva with mutual reverence, enlightened our staff and challenged them to rise even higher in their teaching, and sat with NCSYers for multiple sessions that they will never forget. Rav Zinger certainly helped awaken our imagination.
In a remarkable essay (based on remarks he delivered to a conference of Israeli educators) Rav Zinger writes of the role of space in all relationships- spousal, parental, and teacher/student. He posits that in order for a relationship (or an individual) to truly flourish, there must be room for that growth. There must be space. He writes:
“In Hebrew, we refer to a substitute teacher as a “memaleh makom”, which literally means he “fills space”, but in reality, the better teacher is one who is “mefaneh makom”, who creates a vacuum for the students themselves to fill…”
(A link to the translation of the full article: https://www.thelehrhaus.com/jewish-thought-history/life-between-the-lines/)
So, that was our prime objective for this week. To clear some space, and to watch some extraordinary growth. On the courts, on the shores of the Kinneret, from Eilat mountaintops, in witnessing truly great leaders raise the bar: we identified open areas and contemplated how to best fill them.
This week we continued the NCSY Kollel tradition of Thinking Big. We can’t wait to see where it will lead us next.
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We wish a great Mazal Tov to our South Program Director, Rabbi Yehuda Turetsky and his wife Dr. Ilana Turetsky on the occasion of their son Chaim’s first Hanachas Tefilin which was celebrated in our Beis Medrash on Thursday. As Rabbi Turetsky remarked to the group, Chaim has grown up in NCSY Kollel and it was appropriate to share the momentous occasion with the program. We have enjoyed many first-time Tefilin ceremonies over the years, usually involving NCSYers who are gifted a pair. This one was as special and fitting as any before it. Mazal Tov!
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We head now for our first free weekend. It is a much deserved break and a chance to exhale after this remarkable start to the summer. We so appreciate all of the parental cooperation and patience, especially with the ever-changing regulations and protocols imposed on us. We offered Shabbatons both in Yeshivat Har Etzion (Gush) and with other NCSY groups outside Yerushalayim. We look forward to a restful and inspiring Shabbos away and an enthusiastic return to Beit Meir after!
With dreams and hope from the open spaces of Beit Meir, we wish you the best Shabbos can offer,
Moshe Benovitz
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