By Leyna Krow, Assistant Editor, JTNews
The Jewish Studies Program at the University of Washington will be renamed for Samuel and Althea Stroum at a reception on Sun., May 17.
The renaming of the Jewish Studies Program goes along with a $10 million endowment promised to the school by the Stroum family. According to
UW Jewish Studies assistant director
Jennifer Cohen, the program has recently received just over half of the endowment — the point at which it was agreed the program would take on its new name.
Althea and the late Sam Stroum have been involved with Jewish Studies at the University of Washington since the program’s inception in 1974. Cohen noted that this endowment is not the first gift the Stroums have given to the program, although it is certainly the largest.
“The Stroums are longtime benefactors of the Jewish Studies Program,” Cohen said. “This endowment is just one example of their generosity.”
Althea Stroum credits her husband Samuel, who died in 2001, with instilling in her a love of philanthropy.
“My husband was very dedicated to the purpose of giving and being grateful,” Stroum said. “He influenced me so much. His greatest pride was to give while he was living — not to get credit, but to be able stand up and see what we were doing.”
The Stroums’ philanthropy extends beyond the University of Washington. The Stroum Jewish Community Center on Mercer Island is named for the family and they have been consistent supporters of various arts and health care organizations in the Seattle area.
Gad Barzilai, department chair for the Jewish Studies Program, said the endowment will be used primarily to expand the teaching staff and fund research.
“I am delighted for us to get such an endowment,” Barzilai said. “In times when people are denying the Holocaust and when incidents of anti-Semitism are increasing around the world, to have a strong center of Jewish Studies is important.”
He added that he feels the program is fortunate to have benefited from the Stroums’ enthusiasm for Jewish education.
“We are talking about many years of support and many years of devotion,” he said. “The late Samuel and Althea are helping to build a very professional program with cutting-edge research focusing on the history and culture of Israel, American Jews, and European Jews.”
Althea Stroum will be honored at a reception Sunday evening, at which time the program will officially become the Samuel and Althea Stroum Jewish Studies Program.
May 17 also marks the start of the annual Samuel and Althea Stroum Lecture Series.
The lecture series, which began in 1975, brings to the UW an internationally known Jewish studies scholar each year for three lectures. It is funded in part by support from the Stroums.
Cohen noted that these lectures are popular not only with UW students and faculty, but draw attendants from the larger community as well. Following each year’s series, the program produces a book of the lectures in cooperation with the University of Washington Press.
“They are also broadcast at odd hours on UW TV,” Cohen added. “People tell me they’ve see them at 2 a.m.”
This year’s lecturer is Professor Yael Zerubavel of Rutgers University. Zerubavel studies Israeli collective memory and national culture and is the author of Recovered Roots: Collective Memory and the Making of Israeli National Tradition, which won the 1996 Salo Baron Prize of the American Academy for Jewish Research.
The topic of her lectures is “Encounters with the Past: Remembering the ‘Bygone’ in Israeli Culture.” The series will focus on what the vision for Israel was by the Jewish community when created and how that vision has changed and shaped Israeli culture.