Street Show
“I told you, you can. You’re a Jew, I’m a Jew, it’s what we are. We take things. You can take it.”
Journalism by Jewish college students, for Jewish college students.
Article Archive
Depressed Jew Takes A Name
No one gives you any real guidance on how to handle depression.
I’m A Jew & I Couldn’t Celebrate Rosh Hashanah This Year
For young working-class Jews stuck in abusive living situations, ritual observance can become difficult or impossible – a struggle often erased in American Jewish communities, where classism and assumptions of wealth pervade.
The Torah of OCD
“The Torah of OCD is simple: it is an important and very serious mitzvah to manage my OCD as skillfully as I am able on any given day, seeking out the support and resources I need to live well and in good health. And it is deeply complicated: I am no longer comfortable theologizing pain.”
Hope at the End of the World
“The arch of history bends like a twisty straw. Nothing is inevitable, and the future may be hard, and sometimes rage and grief are necessary. The hope I’m describing is a leap-of-faith conviction that a better future is possible, and worth fighting for.”
Anxiety, Trauma, and Judaism in the Trump Era
A few months after the Pittsburgh shooting, I had my first panic attack. It was triggered by something inconsequential, but my anxiety had been one the rise since that Shabbat. I could feel it in little moments—a rush through my chest, a clench in my stomach, a film behind my eyes.
Full Circle for a New Voices Editor
My first day at New Voices, I remember scanning my desk. It had all the randomness and quirk of the magazine I’d been hired to run: a picture of the original 1970s staff sporting impressive Jew-fros, an old student comic about Israeli politics, and a golem figurine seeming to guard the office stapler. Later that…
Is Kush Kosher? I Went to Cannabis Fest to Find Out
This is the true story of a nice Jewish girl’s adventure at the National Cannabis Festival in Washington DC. I went on a quest to find intersections between Judaism and the healing aspects of cannabis. Although Cannabis Fest DC is a Mecca of marijuana education, culture, and music, my journey with marijuana’s medicinal qualities began…
Should Hillels Do More to Prioritize Mental Health?
I’m no stranger to issues of mental health. Depression set in shortly after the beginning of the second semester of my sophomore year. I cried incessantly for no apparent reason, I had difficulty getting out of bed in the morning, I loathed running into an ex for fear that he would trigger a panic attack….
This Jewish Student Struggled With Anxiety on Campus – So She Started a Nonprofit
For as long as I can remember, I’ve been a worrier. As a perfectionist, everything felt dire. There’s a running joke this means I’m Jewish, but I’ve learned it’s anxiety. I arrived at the University of Florida in 2011, unsure about everything. I could not have known then that my anxiety would inspire me to…
Five Facts: How Colleges Fail Students’ Mental Health
“Could you be imagining a problem where there isn’t one?” The question caught me off guard. Where had I gone wrong? I had come to the campus medical practice at the allotted appointment time. I had waited there for almost two hours, the reception staff reassuring me every so often that it wouldn’t be long….
A Shabbaton Taught Me Wellness as a Woman on the Autism Spectrum
Sarah Waxman and I immediately bonded over our curly, Jew-fro-esque hair. As Jewish women have done for centuries, we swapped notes over the creams, conditioners, gels, and mousses we use to keep the frizz away. But what I really learned from Waxman, the founder of a Jewish women’s wellness initiative, was that my mental health…
“Got Chutzpah?” A note to my mother
February is Jewish Disabilities Awareness and Inclusion Month. Since kindergarten, due to my learning disabilities, social anxiety, and battle with anorexia, I’ve had to have a lot of chutzpah. With anxiety, one needs to be a fighter. I’ve had the most amazing coach in my corner, worthy of Joe DiMaggio. My mother, a guardian angel:…
Bedbugs, Jewish Mothers, and Other Myths
I begin this piece with a massive thank you and apology to the University of Chicago housing staff. A few weeks ago, shortly after returning to school and before the work for the grading quarter had become intense, while absentmindedly perusing the UChicago Housing policy book , I came across the section concerning bedbugs. I…