Engagement Associate

Slifka Center for Jewish Life at Yale (Yale Hillel)

Role Overview

The Joseph Slifka Center for Jewish Life at Yale is seeking to hire a personable, dynamic, and accessible professional to join our team as our new Engagement Associate. This professional will be responsible for expanding our capacity to reach Jewish students where they are, supporting their engagement in and cultivating spaces that enrich their lives.

The Engagement Associate will have strong interpersonal skills, will always know how to make room at the table for a new face, and will understand that engagement in Jewish life on campus is a journey that looks different for everyone. This professional will be passionate about connecting with students who are not yet engaged in Jewish life on campus, including those who hold identities that are underrepresented and have been underserved in Jewish communities. They will be excited to engage students in order to listen deeply to student needs, build meaningful relationships, and foster strong connections between students and staff and students and their peers.

The Engagement Associate will report to the Director of Jewish Student Life and will work closely with the Springboard Social Justice and Arts Fellow and broader Student Life Team to reach our goals of engaging all Jewish students on campus in ways that are meaningful to them.  

What You’ll Do

• You are first and foremost an engager! You will meet students across campus for coffee, tea, or a snack in order to build authentic relationships and to help connect students to friends, community, and experiences
• You are the translator of ideas into action. Using your network of students and your understanding of Slifka and our resources, you help students to take ownership of projects and initiatives and to find and create opportunities of meaning
• Utilize different tools and strategies for reaching students, including social media
• Recruit for cohort learning and immersive experiences such as Birthright and alternative breaks
• Spend time on campus during the week and often on Shabbat and Jewish holidays, offering a multitude of ways for students to connect with Jewish life; sometimes this will mean bringing students into the doors of Slifka, and other times this will mean helping students build their own Jewish experiences outside of the building
• Serve as an active member of the broader Student Life Team by staffing Shabbat Dinners and other Slifka-wide experiences

What You’ll Bring to the Job

• Bachelor's degree and 0-2 years experience
• Passion for connecting with people from different backgrounds with the goal of building authentic and meaningful relationships
• Excellent communication and active listening skills
• Strong commitment to Hillel’s pluralistic vision of Jewish life 
• Proactive approach toward cultivating relationships with under-engaged or not-yet-engaged Jewish students on campus, 
• Creative “on the fly” problem solving skills, and a resilience to “roll with the punches” and go back to the drawing board if your first attempts don’t go according to plan
• Confidence to take initiative to work independently and as part of a supportive team
• Ability to thrive in an environment that is fast-paced and multi-faceted - no two days will be the same 
• Excitement to continue developing your own relationship to Judaism

What You’ll Receive

• Competitive salary in the non-profit marketplace. The salary range for this role is $45,000-$48,000, commensurate with experience
•  A comprehensive benefits package, including health insurance, Group Supplemental Retirement Annuity (GSRA), pension plan, life insurance, Long Term Disability (LTD), Flexible Spending Plan, generous time off leave policy, and parental leave
• Many complimentary meals in Kikar Schusterman, Slifka’s Kosher dining hall, when classes are in session
• Great professional development, mentoring, and skill building opportunities
• Opportunity to attend and sit in on a variety of learning and lectures through the University
• Dedicated and fun colleagues who want to bring out the best in you

About the Slifka Center

Slifka Center is a self-supporting non-profit that serves more than 1,400 Yale undergraduate and graduate students, as well as faculty, staff, and members of the greater New Haven community. The Slifka Center provides a warm, welcoming, and diverse Jewish environment in which students and other members of the university community can connect socially, culturally, intellectually, and spiritually.  The Slifka Center is the home to Yale Hillel which hosts multiple minyanim and communities of students with diverse interests. For more information see www.slifkacenter.org.

Slifka Center for Jewish Life at Yale is affiliated with Hillel International. Hillel International enriches the lives of Jewish students so they may enrich the Jewish people and the world, and envisions a world where every student is inspired to make an enduring commitment to Jewish life, learning and Israel.

About New Haven

New Haven is a small and vibrant city, well situated between Boston and New York City. It has all the perks of a city (a great food scene, concert and theater venues, and lots of coffee shops) with the small town feel of New England. There are great ways to get out into nature with the many parks in New Haven and the surrounding area. Manhattan is also just a train ride away if you want an easy day trip.