by Lenore Elman Asher '49 Combined Jewish Philanthropies of Greater Boston
 

Thank you, Lark, for reading that beautifully written citation. It is the first one ever written for and about me. I am deeply moved at the honor accorded me today by Wells, and I want to thank all of the current and past members of the Awards Committee for the long, hard work involved in making the two selections.

Only after hearing that I was to receive one of the awards did I learn of the process the committee goes through before coming to a decision. When Lark called me, and I was finally able to understand just what she was saying (admittedly with a strong sense of disbelief), I started trying to figure out how so many details of my life for the last 100 years or so had become so familiar to so many people. Patient explanations followed, and I found that some friends from Boston, classmates, other Wells alumnae, and people recommended by the above contributed to the plethora of information the committee gathered and then had to read and judge.

If volunteerism is the basis of my award today, I would like to say that all of those members of the awards committee and in the alumnae association exemplify just how broad-based and involving volunteer work can be. I hope they have found their work as rewarding as I have found my community involvement over the years. I want to add how special today is for the Class of 1949 since Ann and I are classmates.

Standing here today certainly brings back memories of those long ago years in Aurora. Long ago years is the operative phrase! I arrived here in September, 1945 - the year World War II ended - as an unsophisticated 17-year-old from the small town of Bedford Hills, New York, to join 102 other freshmen. I was excited, but terrified. My high school graduating class comprised a mere 29 students, and I was the only one to have traveled to White Plains to take the College Board exams. Having lived a severely circumscribed life during the war years, the prospect of leaving home for four years was daunting. Perhaps frightening better describes my feelings.

Most of you here cannot imagine the Wells of 1945, many of you younger women, anyway. First of all, the tuition, room and board charges were a staggering $1,200 a year. Immediate total immersion into a far more rigorous academic environment than I had ever experienced convinced me that I would definitely flunk out before Thanksgiving (although I did find time to learn to play bridge and smoke cigarettes in the first ten days of dorm life). We looked forward to one movie a week on Saturday night for those of us who did not have dates with 28-year-old former navy officers from Cornell. Autumn brought the same Odd-Even basketball rivalry that you may recall. Those brisk October afternoons on the hockey field remain special memories for me. Student cars were non-existent except for seniors during their last semester. Remember carbon paper? And, if you really want to shock your female offspring, describe the quaint custom of singling out five pretty girls to be decorative objects at the junior prom. And of course, there was a May Queen and her court!! Enough said.

Little did we imagine as we commenced our college education that in only a few short years our language and lives would change to include such unthinkably futuristic items as: color and cable TV you could control from the couch and computers we would learn to use when we returned to graduate school. Or in my case, my grandchildren would attempt to teach me the rudiments of computer use before their patience flagged at my inability to make swift progress; so they have recommended Macs for Dummies; and I am now plowing through it. We have jet planes that can take us to California in five hours or across the Atlantic in six and telephones you can walk around with and make believe you are carrying on important conversations while trying to cross a busy street. Could we have ever imagined, in our white-gloved days, that we could and would pump our own gasoline?

Our vocabulary now includes many new combinations of letters, such as MRI, HMO, VCR, and of course, my personal favorite, ATM. Some of these recollections are of course trivial, but many have become important in our everyday lives. How about the reduction of facsimile to FAX? Do you think you could survive without one? But seriously, we remember when gay meant joyous, abortion was a whispered word, there were no such things as birth control pills, and AIDS was an unknown scourge.

What we do remember, and remember well, is that four years at Wells gave us the tools we would use for a lifetime. We learned what resources we would need to make rational decisions, decisions that affected our lives and families long after we left college. We learned skills that helped us prepare for a life in a continually changing, competitive world; and we learned that we could be whatever we wanted to be. Graduates of a fine women’s college gain enormous emotional and vocational benefits from their college environment.

And since my citation talks about my long-time volunteer work, it is important to tell you that I had my first serious volunteer experience because of Wells. My sociology professor, Jean Davis, had long worked with women at the Auburn prison. When the women were moved to Bedford Hills (my hometown, remember), I accompanied Professor Davis and other Wells students in the area to visit the women inmates when we were on vacation from college. Initially somewhat nervous at the prospect of entering a women’s prison, I soon found the experience challenging. The women were pleased to see us and to talk with us. It had never occurred to me that anyone would care that just spending time with them, just showing some interest and listening, was such an important thing to do.

Which I suppose is the perfect segue into what I have been doing these many years in my own Boston community. One of the voluntary agencies with which I have been principally involved for about 12 years is the Jewish Vocational Service (JVS), an agency of our Boston Jewish Federation. It provides a broad range of services according to current client and community needs, and it is funded from various state, city, and federal sources in addition to an annual allocation from our federation. Because of the influx of refugees from the former Soviet Union and several Asian and African countries in the 80s and 90s, we had to increase staff to serve a large non-English speaking population. Almost the first involvement these refugees had with our agency was entry into ESL (English as a Second Language) classes. As is well known, without basic English skills, vocational opportunities are very limited. Not to go into endless detail about the many testing, counseling, vocational placement, and skills services the agency provides, I would like to briefly describe an important program.

With a grant from the city to be used for training low-income individuals, JVS set up computer training classes to serve both welfare recipients and refugees who met the low income criteria required for acceptance. After 20 weeks of daily classes, homework, instruction in appropriate on-the-job behavior and dress, and vouchers for childcare, our graduation ceremonies took place. Many of the students were single moms and untrained men, who sat side by side with refugees, many of whom had professional positions before emigrating from the former Soviet Union. The juxtaposition of these people from vastly different cultures was startling, but what was so gratifying were the results: enthusiastic, confident people, exulting as they received their certificates and awards, thrilled to be competitive in the job market, anxious to begin work, excited about their futures in the working world. In my view this is, in fact, the only way to remove people from welfare: Teach them skills so they can become self-supporting members of their community, which is what they really want to be.

As Maimonides said: "He who helps a fellow human being to support himself by a gift or a loan, or by finding employment for him thus helping him to become self-supporting, gives the highest form of charity."

Jewish Community Housing for the Elderly (JCHE) is an organization that provides low income housing for the elderly in several locations in the greater Boston community. Making affordable housing available to elderly people so they may live independently and with dignity is our goal. Housing and Urban Development (HUD), a federal agency, provides the money for the bricks and mortar; but we raise money for JCHE to ensure that our residents receive the services they need in order to remain independent. Since people are living longer than ever, the average age of our residents is 85. But the activities they enjoy have no age limits.

Imagine a class of 80 to 90-year-olds sitting at computers, e-mailing their grandchildren and great-grandchildren, or a class in creative writing from which a book of short stories and essays has been compiled and which is for sale, or these same elderly folks learning English even though many of them have lived most of their lives in China and Eastern Europe.

Because of the recent restrictions imposed on our refugee population by the federal government, we have had to establish classes in citizenship so that our Asian and Russian residents can learn about their new country. Courses on the constitution and American culture are taught by a Chinese woman and a Russian couple. Some months ago I attended a graduation class for about 200 people who had qualified, through these classes, to become American citizens. As citizens, they are qualified to receive the benefits they need to survive. Almost as important is the sense of pride and self-esteem they enjoy from the education which has enabled them to become American citizens. Incidentally, the average income of our residents is about $8,000 a year.

Involvement in the many (probably too many) organizations in which I find myself has kept me constantly challenged, certainly busy, and almost content with what I do. The only exception is political involvement when my candidates do not win. Fund raising is a natural concomitant of working for non-profits, and I am beginning to detect a steely-eyed look from the people I approach to discuss one good cause or another. I get the feeling that they plan to pull down the shades and turn off the lights when I come to call. And, even though I subscribe to Margaret Mead’s quote, "Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful committed citizens can change the world; indeed it’s the only thing that ever has," I am not sure it always works that way. Look how long it took us to stop the war in Vietnam, get the vote, and break the glass ceiling (or at least crack it) in many previously all male businesses and professions. Since reading Mead was a major requirement in my sociology courses at Wells, I do not feel I can totally ignore her admonition.

I have been hugely fortunate in my life. My husband has been supportive of my many interests. Meetings have disrupted some of our plans; traveling, particularly to Israel and other U.S. cities for conferences, has left him a bachelor on many occasions over the years. However, I think he is pleased that I have so much to do that I am never bored nor lament that I had nothing to do today. Our family is an ongoing source of joy and fulfillment to me. Our four sons and their wonderful wives have blessed us with nine grandchildren. These kids are the pride of our lives. My thanks to all of them for what they have contributed and continue to contribute in so many ways to Norman and me. Special thanks to Henry for coming with his dad today to represent the family.

And thanks to Wells for showing me how important women are to women. My women friends fill a huge part of my life and are very dear to me. Thanks to Wells for helping me grow from that awkward 17-year-old who was dumbstruck at her first sight of Cayuga Lake, to the grandmother I am now who not only feels comfortable in many strange countries but is extremely fortunate to still be able to travel and learn.

I cannot forget to give special thanks to the Boston Wells Club who arranged a lovely party in my honor in April. Both President Ryerson and Sue Jones ‘78 paid me the honor of coming all the way to Boston to join the festive gathering.

It has been a high honor and an unqualified pleasure to be here today. My family, my friends who have made the trip, and I thank you for making this occasion so special.

If all goes well, I will return next year with my classmates for our 50^th Reunion. I look forward to seeing many of you then.

Delivered Saturday, May 31, 1998, in Phipps Auditorium at Wells College