Members of the Syracuse University community are working together to accommodate students in advance of Friday’s football game, which conflicts with Yom Kippur for the second consecutive year.

On Friday, Syracuse will face off against Louisville at 7 p.m. in the Carrier Dome, only a short walk from Hendricks Chapel where services for Yom Kippur will be held.

“Kickoff times for both the football game and Kol Nidre services are essentially the same,” said Zach Goldberg, president of the Hillel Jewish Student Union Board.

Kol Nidre is a specific, soft-spoken service held during Yom Kippur that is one of the most sacred within the Jewish faith, Goldberg said. This is not the first time the SU football schedule has conflicted with the Jewish holidays. Last year the football scheduled overlapped with Yom Kippur as well, Goldberg said.

“I am a little disappointed that this problem arose again this year,” he said

After last year’s scheduling conflict, several university groups including Hillel at SU, Hendricks Chapel, the SU Athletics Department, Student Association and administration officials came together to discuss how to plan and prevent this from happening in the future. Once it became clear the conflict would occur again, the university and the Athletics Department were involved in helping to accommodate the religious services without disruption.

The pre-game celebrations usually held on the Quad and on the steps of Hendricks Chapel will be moved to the Life Sciences and Technology building and signs will be posted indicating that services are occurring and foot traffic will be diverted away from the Hendricks Chapel entrance, said Brian Small, executive director of Hillel at SU.

Small said he provided SU Athletics with a list of the upcoming 2014 Jewish holidays, which prompted the Athletics Department to file a formal accommodation request with the Atlantic Coast Conference.

When the 2014–15 football schedule was released with the very same conflict, Small said he believes everyone was caught by surprise, including the Athletics Department.

“It is very easy to pass blame around, but the largest crime was that some parties didn’t have all the control they wanted,” Small said. “Promises were made that simply cannot be kept.”

Small pointed out that many other factors hold influence over scheduling, from national broadcasting rights to logistics to previous contracts.

One major ally in the cause was Student Association President Boris Gresely, who worked from the beginning to address the conflict.

“What makes this university unique is our commitment to diversity,” Gresely said. “This is a case where we didn’t commit to that, we let in outside influences.”

Goldberg and Small both agreed that having Gresely work with them was very important.

“It was great to have Boris on board,” Goldberg said. “It is really cool seeing students outside of the Jewish community supporting us.”

David Kimelman, executive vice president and vice president of religious life of the Hillel Jewish Student Union, said that while the football game is scheduled for the same time as Yom Kippur services, he does not think attendance will be affected.

“Attending services is each student’s individual choice. I don’t think the game being at the same time will have too much impact,” said Kimelman, a junior political science and policy studies dual major. “It is just unfortunate that Jewish students have to chose between football and Yom Kippur services.”

But Gresely, Small, Kimelman and Goldberg all said they agree that the university and SU Athletics were accommodating and supportive of respecting the religious worship of students by making specific changes to logistics.

Small said he hopes situations likes these create a dialogue about the overall message SU is trying to foster.

“This underlines the point about the ethics and morals of campus,” he said. “Is it football and ESPN, or creating a pluralistic religious environment?”

Published on October 2, 2014 at 12:01 am

Contact Jen: jbundy@syr.edu