To the editor:

In 1948, Brandeis University was founded by the American Jewish community at a time when Jews and other minorities faced widespread discrimination in higher education. The goal was not to create a university for Jewish students, but one in which Jewish students were fully included and where Jewish values helped shape the institution’s culture. One of the clearest expressions of this commitment was the academic calendar.

Just as winter break is centered around the Christian holiday of Christmas, Brandeis historically chose not to hold classes on major Jewish holidays in the fall or on Passover in the spring. This is especially important because many Jewish holidays include work restrictions that prohibit writing and electronic usage. Brandeis is one of the few universities where Jewish students have this level of institutional inclusion.

At Brandeis, Jewish holidays are not an accommodation layered onto a secular calendar; they are part of the calendar itself. A recent Justice editorial suggested replacing these days off with excused absences. While this may sound equitable in theory, it fails in practice. Excused absences place the burden on students to negotiate makeup work and independently learn material from missed classes. When multiple Jewish holidays fall on weekdays in the fall, this leaves Jewish students consistently behind.

This is not hypothetical. When Brandeis does not give a Jewish holiday off, many students—including myself—are left scrambling to catch up, while others forgo observance to avoid falling behind. Brandeis is a safe haven for Jewish students where their identity isn’t just “excused” but included. Replacing days off with excused absences would shift Jewish observance from a shared institutional value to a private inconvenience.

Calls to reduce Jewish holidays misunderstand Brandeis’ identity—not just as a diverse university, but as a Jewish-founded institution that continues to integrate Jewish values into its public life.

Mateo Levin ‘27