I so enjoyed tonight’s lecture! So interesting. All of them have been amazing. I’m thrilled to be a part of this series.

-Joanne S.

I wanted to commend you on this “tour.” Bob and I enjoyed it immensely and thought the information and preparation was excellent. I felt like I was really there.

-Natalie S.

Thanks very much for a terrific program today – very informative and we loved the visuals. A great way to “travel” while we are restricted at home.

-Ellen B.

Prof. Berk is one of the very few speakers who can hold my attention for one hour. His knowledge, annotations and delivery are superb. I am so glad I signed up for the series, and am looking forward to part two.

-Marlene C

CONNECT, VIRTUALLY

Explore the Jewish world from the comfort of your home

Ayelet’s Worldwide Traveling University is the premier Jewish Scholar travel program, and now you can access high level scholarly lectures normally available only on tour…from home!

Our scholars in residence and partner scholars and guides worldwide are featured in these Ayelet exclusive programs.

FEATURED PROGRAMS

Four Towering Figures who Changed the World (Series THREE)

Presented by Prof. Stephen Berk

Jan 12 at 7:30 pm ET: Fidel Castro
Jan 19 at 7:30 pm ET: Margaret Thatcher
Jan 26 at 7:30 pm ET: Pope Pius XII
Feb 2 at 7:30 pm ET: David Ben Gurion

$80 for all four (4) sessions

+ Book Online

The Dark Side of Fiddler:
Eastern Europe’s Forgotten Jews

Presented by Prof. Natan Meir

Feb 3 – The Cholera Wedding: East European Jews’ Magical Ritual to End an Epidemic
Feb 10–Town Fools, Madmen, and Possessed Women: The Mentally Ill in Jewish Eastern Europe
Feb 17 –A Home for the Homeless? The Jewish Poorhouse of Eastern Europe
Feb 24– Drafting the Undesirables: Jewish Conscription to the Imperial Russian Military under Nicholas I

$80 for all four (4) sessions

+ Book Online

Past Lecture Series – Recordings available

Catching up? Receive private access links to view these outstanding past programs. From Prof. Berk’s popular “Towering Figures”, to the virtual tour “Spanish Cities, Jewish Stories” and beyond, these programs offer you access to top level scholarship, viewed at your leisure.

Four Towering Figures Who Changed The World (Series ONE)

Presented by Prof. Stephen Berk

Join us as we discover the people who shaped the world we inhabit…for better or for worse!

Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Adolf Hitler, Joseph Stalin, and Vladimir Lenin

$80 for all four (4) sessions

+ Book Online

Four Towering Figures who Changed the World (Series TWO)

Presented by Prof. Stephen Berk

“Personality is important in history. In the 20th century, a handful of people changed the course of modern times. The influence of these individuals resonates down to the present.”
– Prof. Stephen Berk

Winston Churchill, Mao Zedong, Harry S. Truman, and Golda Meir

$80 for all four (4) sessions

+ Book Online

Spanish Cities, Jewish Stories

Join us as we explore Sephardic history, featuring insight by our local Scholars in Spain

Madrid/Toledo, Grenada, Seville, Barcelona, and Majorca

$90 for all five (5) sessions

+ Book Online

+ Read More

About our Scholars-in-Residence…

Dr. Stephen Berk

Dr. Stephen M. Berk is a Professor of History at Union College in Schenectady, New York, Chair of the Department of History, Director of the Program in Comparative Communist Studies and Faculty Advisor to the Jewish Student Organization. He is author of Year of Crisis, Year of Hope: Russian Jewry and the Pogroms of 1881-1882 (Greenwood Press, 1985). At the present time Professor Berk is writing a book entitled, Our People Are Your People: American Jewry and the Struggle for Civil Rights 1854-1965. The book provides an interesting discussion of an extremely important chapter in the history of the civil rights movement and attempts to dispel the myths and misunderstandings that surround the Black-Jewish relationship. Professor Berk is also the author of many articles on Russian History, Russian Jewish History, anti-Semitism and American Policy in the Middle East. Professor Berk is frequently consulted by newspaper reporters and by television and radio stations including the BBC. He has lectured in numerous universities in countless cities and towns in the United States and Israel and is a primary speaker for the UJA, Israel Bonds and B’nai B’rith. Professor Berk is considered an absolutely superb lecturer and teacher. Touring with him has been compared to attending a “traveling university…his lectures are outstanding.” He is always informative, interesting and entertaining. He has lectured as scholar-in-residence for us on many trips to Russia, Spain, the Caribbean, Eastern Europe, Europe and Israel. It is a privilege to have him with us!

Prof. Natan Meir

From his groundbreaking research on the Jews of Russia and Ukraine to his work as a consultant for Moscow’s Jewish Museum, Professor Natan Meir, Lorry I. Lokey Professor of Judaic Studies at Portland State University in Oregon, has earned an international reputation as a scholar of Jewish social, cultural, and religious history. His latest book, Stepchildren of the Shtetl, recovers the histories of Jewish Eastern Europe’s social outcasts: the disabled, the mentally ill, orphans, and beggars. His previous book, Kiev, Jewish Metropolis, explored Jewish life and culture in a Ukrainian city under Russian imperial rule. Students praise his classroom as an inspiring intellectual space. An avid trailrunner, he speaks eight languages and is now working on his ninth.