By Reporter staff

Hillel at Binghamton and the Jewish Federation of Greater Binghamton will offer a L’Dor V’Dor Pen Pal Program. The program will match Binghamton University students with seniors in the local Jewish community for the fall semester, September to December. The semester will end with a meet and greet. Seniors who are interested in engaging with a pen pal should visit www.jfgb.org and click on the L’Dor V’Dor Pen Pal Program slide to sign up for a pen pal. The deadline to submit the form is Tuesday, August 26. Pen pal pairings will be sent out by Tuesday, September 2. For any questions or help filling out the form, contact Ellie Spivak, incoming president of Hillel at Binghamton, at 585-770-8312 or espivak1@binghamton.edu, or Shelley Hubal, executive director of the Federation, at 607-222-9026 or director@jfgb.org.
“Our program will give you the opportunity to write back and forth to your pen pal to get to know each other, learn from each other and discuss meaningful prompts and questions that will be sent out monthly,” said organizers of the program. “You will have the option of e-mailing, texting or handwriting letters to your pen pal, whatever is most comfortable to you. We will try to match pen pal pairs with the same letter format preference. Pen pals are expected to write to their match no less than once per month. At the end of the semester, before finals week, there will be a meet and greet event on the Binghamton University campus for you to meet your pen pal.”
“When I first came up with the idea for the L’Dor V’Dor pen pal program, I was thinking about the divide that I have felt between our on-campus Jewish community and the wider Binghamton community and, more specifically, the lack of connection between the generations,” said Spivak. “In high school, I got the chance to write to a senior pen pal, and I learned so much from the experience. Students have so much to learn from the older generation, but, in college, we are very isolated amongst only people of our age.”
Spivak noted that “the goal of this program is to promote connectivity and community amongst the on-campus student Jewish community and the Jewish senior community living in Binghamton. Students and seniors will write back and forth with their matched pen pal throughout the academic semester, and the program will culminate at the end with a meet and greet, where pen pals will have the chance to meet in person! I will send out monthly prompts that pen pal pairs can have the option of addressing in their letters. Please consider signing up to receive a student pen pal and new friend!”
“I was excited when Elie Spivak from Hillel at Binghamton University approached me with this idea,” Hubal said. “Having a university student pen pal is a great way to make a new friend and to cross a generational divide. If you are curious about the younger generation, this is a great way to learn something new.”